Mexitaliamerica

Tastefully Done

2009-11-11T10:13:00.001-08:00

I've been back on Trauma this past month once again. I for some reason seem to have a better attitude this month about it. That is a good thing since I'm a little more pleasant when I come home.

We had a patient who I was discharging the other day and I was answering questions before he left. He very nice, educated and had a few questions. Our conversation went a little like this:

Me: Now you're going to be tired for awhile

Patient: I noticed. I was running out of energy just walking to the bathroom. How long do you think it will last?

Me: Likely a few weeks. Your gonna feel like...(long pause)...(you can see me ponder my next statement carefully)...

Me: You're gonna feel pretty worked over. I was going to say, it will feel like you had just been hit by a truck. But that actually happened. So, Yes. You will be tired.

He laughed as hard as I did. I'm a comedic genius.

PTSD

2009-10-30T09:56:00.000-07:00

I have to say the past month as been going pretty well. The majority of my shifts have been in the urgent care/pediatrics section of the emergency department. I like the turnover and the opportunity to play with little kids. For the most part they get my humor...or at least appease me by laughing.

Yesterday was going great until I walked by a patients room. Immediately after a quick glance in I blacked out, peed my pants, and found myself balled up in the corner sucking my thumb. What horrible thing could I have seen within that patient room you ask? No it wasn't a zombie, a mother eating her baby whole, or even worse Nancy Pelosi. It was one of my patients. A mother who's baby I delivered almost 2 whole years ago. This just wasn't any delivery. I had to brush my teeth and shower with bleach for an entire week. The delivery was uncomplicated, but the aftermath has scarred me for life. You see after the baby was out and there was nothing but a pool of blood in between the patients leg (which doesn't bother me one bit) I noticed something. Bubbles. Bubbles that were getting bigger and increasing in size. My heart began to race and beads of sweat accumulated on my brow. What was about to happen I asked myself. I was scared. Then I saw it. A giant brown turd. To make matters worse the patient peeked her head up to see what it looked like and grinned as if she was more proud of the second thing to exit her body that morning. My life has never been the same. I am actually gagging on my own vomitus as I write the post.

I can't take it anymore. I'm going back to my fetal position. Its the only safe place...

Compassion In Chaos

2009-10-01T22:49:00.001-07:00

The last 40 hours have been a complete roller coaster. I just completed a 34 hour shift that spanned the entire spectrum of the medical profession. I have to say, I am absolutely exhausted. I started my day yesterday at 0700 in the Urology Grand Rounds. After a couple of hours of learning about testicular cancer, bladder reconstruction, and Gangrene of the testicles I hopped in my car and headed full speed to the private hospital in town to finish my last shift in the ICU. I saw a few of my left over patients, one of which had a heart attack and tried to die early yesterday morning. I admitted a depressed man who took 60 Xanax at once then called his friend to tell him what he did. His friend didn't come over. Waited for the next morning to call the paramedics. Something I would do to my arch enemies.

After my shift ended I got signout from the General Surgery team and started a call night for general surgery. I was quickly paged by two attendings to see a patient in the ED with a butt abscess as well as a colon cancer patient on the floor. My head was spinning by midnight. I fell asleep to Sportscenter ringing in the background. When I woke up I again jumped in my car and headed back to the University. I grabbed a quick breakfast and headed to the ED to start my first shift. I had trouble spelling my name at this point.

I rounded out my day with a patient with testicular pain and the cutest little spanish speaking girl with a cold. She must of liked me because of my terrible spanish. I admit, I would laugh at me stuttering in a different language. I fumbled through her discharge instructions in spanish to her mom, who was very pleased that I was even trying. I waved goodbye to my patient and she walked over and gave me a big hug. It was something so small (literally) but it reminded me why I suffer through the chaos that has become my life. Thanks little mexican girl. You're welcome to come play with The Foof in Mexitaliamerica anytime. Once your over your cold of course.

The Initial Shock

2009-09-04T10:15:00.000-07:00

Hello. You're still here? If I had known all three of my readers were still checking this blog, I might have left a few more posts in the interim. Hindsight is always 20/20 I guess. Well, there has been a reason for my absentee-ism. Real life has set in. I have spent the last 8 years postponing any resemblance of a real job by staying in college. As you are aware that came crashing down this past July. In all honesty it hasn't been too bad. However, it leaves me with little time for anything else. I barely have enough time to play with Little Bunny Foo-Foo. There have been days where I leave before she wakes up and come home after she is in bed. Or even worse, leave when she is asleep and come back the next day after she has been up for hours.

To make things worse I am doing my intern year in a program riddled with problems. I literally have a countdown to the day I start Urology. The surgery program is on "double secret probation" for duty hour violations (working their residents more than 80 hours a week) and what I like to call "FEAR-MONGERING" for the way they treat their residents. The big-wigs rule in March if the program will go on REAL probation next year which according to our superiors has a 95% likelihood. Oh the joys of surgery.

But in the last 2 months I've managed to survive surgical oncology and the dreaded trauma service. Trauma was terrible. I was in the OR only once and spent the entire month helping people that could care less that I was helping them. Then to add salt to the wound, 90% of the patients were all doing something they should not have been doing in the first place... like being 9 years old and riding an ATV at midnight, starting a knife fight, losing a knife fight, playing the game "TAG" with real bullets, drinking and driving, drinking and biking, drinking and walking, and my personal favorite...losing a bar fight against someone with a broken glass bottle and asking "do I look like the Joker?" while your best friend giggles under his over-the-legal-limit breath. As you can imagine I was not a happy camper for the last month.

On the plus side, I somehow landed a rotation at one of the cities private hospitals in their ICU. The hours are great, they let you put in all sorts of central lines, and I have time to blog and play with The Foof. I think the hardest part of my new found employment is I get to call the shots from time to time...and frighteningly enough, people listen.

Yesterday was particularly tough. My patient has widespread breast cancer. She is bed bound, septic, intubated, and has likely had a heart attack during her short 3 day stay. Frankly, the family needs to let this poor lady die. But of course, the family is crazy. Asking us to throw everything but the kitchen sink at this lady (the kitchen sink is a metaphor for blood products because the patient happens to be Jehovah's Witness). Don't act like your not impressed. It was very surreal standing in front of a family and recommending they pull the plug. It was very difficult especially since the they weren't listening. For over eight years I had routinely stood behind somebody as they made similar recommendations and nodded quietly. From now on, I have nobody to hide behind since it is my words starting these conversations. Responsibility is hard sometimes. I guess it will take a little more time getting use to those two little initials hanging on to my name.

Back In The Saddle Again

2009-06-28T22:28:00.000-07:00

Why hello. How long have you been here? Apparently longer than I have. Life has been hectic in the past couple of months. A number of things have transpired since the last post. For starters, I am officially a doctor now! This thought still frightens me. I've actually spent the last 7 days straight in orientation to start my residency and I am now certified in Basic Life Support, Advanced Cardiac Life Support, and Advanced Trauma Life Support. With all these credentials behind me, my real job starts in 3 days. Now mind you, the last time I saw a patient and worked in an actual hospital was sometime in early March. Well when Wednesday (Doomsday) rolls around I will stroll into the hospital a new (albeit slightly dumber) man than the last time I entered.

To salt the wound a little more, my first shift will last approximately 30 hours. Yes, I managed to draw the short straw and will have to take call my very first day as a resident. This thought literally makes my little butt hole quiver. I will be running around the hospital all night answering 4 pagers trying to ensure patients that I barely know survive until morning. Oh, and by the way...when I'm not on the floor you can find me in the Trauma bay stapling belligerent drunks heads shut. The more I think about it, the faster I feel my heart beat. I guess I can't complain too much because there will be 120 residents in our hospital alone with that similar feeling in their stomachs. So I won't be the only person wandering the hospital like a lost puppy. I just hope my patients ask me about my thoughts on Iron Chef America and not the doses of their Warfarin. That way they are likely to get a more educated answer.

To Be Continued...

Daddy Day Care

2009-04-29T10:25:00.001-07:00

Well it has been quite awhile since I posted last. I apologize for the lack of internet superciliousness (yeah I just used the thesaurus on that one) in my absence. However, it has been Little Bunny Foo Foo and Me for the past month. You see, I finished my credits last month and instead of paying for The Cryptkeeper to come and watch our baby...I do it myself for a nominal fee. I have to admit, its a pretty sweet job. The Foof just happens to like all the things I like. For example, I love to nap. Miraculously, so does she! I've never fallen in love so quickly. The rest of our day consists of eating, walks around the neighborhood, and my playing the guitar while she smiles and plays with her toys. She loves to be sung to.

We do all this amongst the chaos of our townhouse. You see we just bought a house two weeks ago, so all of our belongings are packed away in boxes. Yesterday I got half way through making dinner to realize all the baking sheets had been packed. Note to self, paper plates are not the same as baking sheets. In case you were wondering, our fire alarm works fine.

Even though buying a house is very satisfying, it has been a very frustrarting process. Since we closed not one thing has gone smoothly. We hired someone to put wooden slats on the fence. Simple job one would think. We he didn't cut the wood so the wood extended 2 feet above the concrete pillars. Then our tile guy said it would take him 4 days to complete the tile. Well its almost been two weeks and he hasn't worked the past 3 days. Yesterday I couldn't even get him to pick up his cell phone. Then to top it all off, every time I go over to see the progress I have to pick up Bud Light cans strewn all over the premises. It seems every time I put The Foof down for a nap, I spend the entire time on the phone with installers making sure they are actually at the house working. My life has truly become a real life Daddy Day Care. The shocker is, I'm only taking care of one toddler.

Tales from the Crypt?

2009-02-06T12:37:00.001-08:00

You know as a parent, you quickly become incredibly protective. Especially fathers. It's your job to chase the ghosts from the closet, use your shoe to kill daddy long legs, and keep unwanted strangers away from your family...especially your kids. The Foof is growing by leaps and bounds and our family is changing everyday with her. This week we faced a very unique challenge. A Nanny. Yes, apparently you need to actually go to the hospital whilest in medical school (Mind you, this is something I have avoided since early November). In addition to that, the Hunny Bunny actually has to work since I actually pay thousands of dollars to show up and work 90 hours a week (makes sense to me). So our ability to pay the bills and have insurance rests on the Hunny Bunnies cute, furry shoulders. This of course leaves us with one small (albeit very cute) dilemma. What does The Foof do during the day? Our options included dropping her off at the local daycare, a zestpool of germs, snot, and poo. We would have to take her in the back everyday and hose her off so the stench wouldn't peel the paint off of our walls. We decided against that. Option 2 (my personal favorite) was to leave her at home with Zed and Ari. They are very attentive and this was the actual reason I invested in two dogs for in the first place. However, this argument was quickly vetoed. So this left us with only one choice. A Nanny.

We used and agency since searching the funny pages for Nannies lead to multiple dead end ads of people who lived in a van and offered free mammograms with their nanny-ing service. Shady. Very Shady. Well Wednesday came and I was very pleased with the nanny we had. She could care less that I was still there getting ready. She was all about Little Bunny Foo Foo. She will be coming back next week. However, on Thursday said nanny was unavailable. We had to request another. As I was eating breakfast, I looked up to observe our new nanny walking up our driveway. This is literally what I saw:

Needless to say, I was worried. This nanny was old and I questioned her competence as well as her hearts ability to actually circulate blood to the rest of her body . She quickly put the baby down and while I was eating and tried to relate every minute detail from the year Nineteen Dickety-Two. She rehearsed how she would fight off sabertooth tigers for food, invented fire, and meet the great General Washington at her log house. I didn't doubt that she did all of these things but now wondered if she would ever stop talking so I could finish getting ready for work. I came home as soon as I could worried that I would have to dust off my own CPR training on my own nanny (whom ironically comes CPR certified). Thankfully, all was well and The Foof was happy to see me home. She cried as soon as I walked in the door so the cryptkeeper had to give her up. I said she was free to go but she stayed for another half hour while I rocked the baby to sleep to finish tracing her family tree back to the Pre-Columbian era.

It goes without saying that we won't be asking her to return. I should ask for at least part of my money back because I need to give The Foof a bath tonight to rid her of the smell of Old Lady Farts. I guess there are some smells you can't protect your children from.

Birdflu

2009-01-16T12:52:00.000-08:00

Having a baby is a great thing. Especially when you have no responsibility whatsoever for anything else. Little Bunny Foo-Foo gets all my attention. And when she goes to sleep...the internets gets my undivided attention. Instead of studying for yet another Board Exam that I take next month, I spend my afternoons scowering the web for nothing-in-particular. It's funny how that works. I've been home for 8 weeks now and don't really have anything to show for it other than A) I'm really good at changing diapers and B) can walk from my bedroom to the guestroom with my eyes closed at 3 in the morning to change yet another diaper. Hmmm. Speaking of which...a feat like that should elevate me to Ninja status.

Anyways. While surfing the web the web I found this gem of a fact. With the weekend looming there is an incredible amount of great sports on including the NFL playoffs (PLAYOFFS?!?! DID SOMEBODY SAY PLAYOFFS?!?!). The thing that excites me about this weekend is the Cardinals are on the verge of a Superbowl birth. I'm pretty sure I read in the Book of Revelation last week that this is one of the impending signs of the Apocalypse (as well as UNC losing two in a row and the Wildcats having 2 top 25 wins but still find time to get blown out by Stanford). Also, whilest reading that Book I think I heard something about pestilence which is simply defined as "any virulent and highly infectious disease that can cause an epidemic or even a pandemic". Thus I turn your attention to this quote from The Sports Guy:

So you have the Cardinals beating the Seahawks in Week 17, then the Falcons in Round 1, and now, potentially, the Eagles in the NFC title game. Meanwhile, if the Ravens topple the Steelers, then the Cardinals could potentially beat every other NFL team with a bird nickname during their improbable five-game winning streak to capture the Super Bowl, and if that's not enough, birds took down Thursday's U.S. Airways flight heading from New York to Charlotte ... the city that's home to the team Arizona beat five days ago in Round 2. All I can tell you is this: Something better not happen to Larry Bird. You hear me, Arizona? Leave the Basketball Jesus out of your weird bird vendetta! Got it?

If thats not pestilence by Birdflu, I don't know what is. I side with the Sports Guy. You leave Larry Legend alone Arizona or my cheers will forever fall on deaf ears. Signs and wonders aside, I hope all our pants are flame-retardant. Go Cards!

Madison Victoria!

2008-11-21T12:51:00.001-08:00

I will cut to the chase right away. Early Thursday morning at 2:19 AM weighing in at 6 lb. 11 oz. the Hunny Bunny gave birth to a beautiful and healthy baby girl, Madison Victoria. The Hunny Bunny and Little Bunny Foo Foo are both doing great and napping whilst I type quietly. The following is a timeline of the incredible 24 hours leading up to the most wonderful event in our married lives...

Wednesday November 19th, 2008

0600 hours: Alarm sounds. I stumble not out of bed. But off the couch. A couch in Los Angeles, CA. Yes, I am not in Tucson. Today is a big day for a Residency Interview. One of my top choices. I'm excited.

0610 hours: Text message. "Say a prayer for me my belly hurts. I think its just gas but won't go away".

0611 hours: Underwear change.

0612 hours: Phone call to the Hunny Bunny. Reassures me that she is doing ok. Encourages me to go to my interview. I remind you at this point in time 5 days prior she was less than 1cm dialated and has had very few contractions to this point. Also, we are still 2 entire weeks until our due date.

0615 hours: Begin preparing for my interview. Shower, shave, wax, pluck, practice social smile and eyebrow raise in mirror with no shirt on. Read my CV one last time.

0740 hours: An entire hour and 20 minutes before the interview I'm out the door to sit in traffic. Yippee. Stupid LA traffic.

0745 hours: Phone call to the Hunny Bunny. The pain this morning were irregular contractions. "False Labor" as we call it in the business. They are going away at this point. A good thing. Underwear changes are much more difficult in a suit.

0850 hours: Arrive at the interview. Meet fellow interviewees. My suit is the most Mack Daddy in the room. Life is good.

0900 hours: Interview officially starts. Tour of the hospital, meet the faculty, lunch with the residents, 6 individual interviews with faculty members. So far so good.

0950 hours: Text message. "The belly pain is gone. Heading into work".

0951 hours: Sigh of relief.

1400 hours: Text message the Hunny Bunny to see how she is doing. Still no belly pain. Life is still good.

1700 hours: Interview concludes. All in all an awesome day. Rocked the interviews out of the park. Told the residents I would see them in the morning for a couple of hours so I can come back and hang out.

1705 hours: Traffic.

1706 hours: Elated phone call to the Hunny Bunny talking about my interview. As we were talking on the phone, (Gulp) irregular contractions start again.

1800 hours: Arrive at dinner. Great to send spend time with the family I lived with during my away rotations. Bottle them with a delicious carne asada burrito...and you have something sweeter than Yoo-Hoo.

1830 hours: The Hunny Bunny phones again. This time there is a little panic in her voice. She is now having contractions every 15 minutes. She quietly states, "I want you to come home now". I hang up the phone look everyone at the dinner table and tell them my trip is going to be cut short, I have a baby to catch.

1831 hours: Underwear change.

1930: Back at the house. Grab my bag call my airlines. I frantically tell the woman on the phone my story. She is excited to help me find a flight. "1000am tomorrow morning is the soonest I can get you there." You have got to be kidding me. I begin to loose my patience. I tell her to search all the LA airports to get me back to Tucson. "This is very weird" she states, "There must be something going on in LA...the last flight out was at 630pm." I couldn't believe it. Nobody could get us there. We thought she was just slow, so to confirm I looked quickly online. She was right. Nothing. I had but one choice...start driving.

1931 hours: Underwear change.

1932 hours: Hop in the rental car and start speeding.

1935 hours: Back on I-10 heading home. My cell phone battery is dying. I am ordered by the Hunny Bunny to get a charger. I stop at the closest Best Buy and buy a car charger (which I exchanged the next day for another memory card). I'm on my way baby. Make sure your sitting with your legs crossed.

2030 hours: Contractions are getting stronger and closer together.

2031 hours: Underwear change. Yes I am in the rental car and no I didn't have to pay extra for the stain.

2130 hours: The Hunny Bunny's waters break. Now she is worried I won't make it back in time. The feeling is now mutual.

2145 hours: Contractions are 8 minutes apart. Our friend arrives at the house to pick her up. My mom is en route to meet them at the hospital.

2230 hours: Phone call from my wife's driver. Had trouble placing an IV (still not sure how you struggle to find veins on a pregnant woman, but thats neither here nor there). After her IV she is 3cm dilated but still having regular contractions. Contrary to our previous decision, she opts for the epidural.

2231 hours: Praise God, I think to myself. At 3cm and her first child, she won't be delivering for awhile. I notice on my speedometer the needle just went from 95mph to 90mph.

2235 hours: The Hunny Bunny is getting her epidural. I call MarkyV for a late night pep-talk. We covered becoming a father for the first time, the debacle of season the UofA Basketball team is having, and take bets on what color her eyes will be. "Good talk Russ".

2345 hours: Caller ID says "Hunny Bunny". When I answer it is my mom this time. "She is COMPLETE". (GULP). You have got to be kidding me. How on earth does a first time mother go from 3cm to 10cm in less than an hour. They couldn't even pass a catheter because the baby was on her way down the birth canal. Oh this girl is so grounded when she comes out.

2346 hours: The Hunny Bunny gets on the phone. We both know I can't make it back now. But thanks to the marvel of technology, I can still be her coach via SPEAKERPHONE!

2350 hours: It starts to hit me that I am hours away from being a father. I'm somewhere near the California border, but I couldn't be happier.

Thursday November 20th, 2008

0100 hours: Its pushing time. Even via speakerphone, I'm a great Labor and Delivery coach. The Hunny Bunny is lucky to have me. Mind you, I'm even luckier having her.

0200 hours: The baby is THERE! The doctor is dragging his feet getting to the hospital (doctors kill me sometimes). The Hunny Bunny is in a holding pattern waiting for him. Can you imagine. If she was able to push, this baby would have been out in an hour. I'm gonna check the world record books for the fastest labor times.

0205 hours: A photo-radar camera in PHX takes my picture breaking the land speed record in a Chevy Cobalt. I can't help but laugh. Everyone in the hospital finds it just as hilarious.

0219 hours: The Baby is Out! Madison Victoria enters the world! Eighteen inches and 6lbs 11.4oz of beauty.

0225 hours: The Placenta is Out! The Hunny Bunny finally understands why I call it the Jellyfish.

0230 hours: Momma and baby are doing great.

0300 hours: Baby's first meal starts.

0400 hours: Baby's first meal ends.

0401 hours: Poppa Bear is here! I lay eyes on the most magnificent little girl ever! Brown hair, blue eyes, skin like her mothers. She is adorable. Thank goodness she doesn't look like her father!

0430 hours: I get the honors of giving Little Bunny Foo Foo her first bath and put on her first diaper. Did I mention she is incredible?

0500 hours: With 8 hours behind the wheel and 4 hours of active labor behind us. We couldn't be more happy (or tired). We make it up to our room, kiss Madison goodnight and all three of us for the first time go to sleep together. Nothing went according to our birth plan, but it ended more perfectly than we could have ever imagined. Even though she is grounded...she already has her Dadddy wrapped around her tiny little fingers.

Proud Mommy and Daddy after my long drive in.

She loves to sleep like Daddy! Finally get to hold Little Bunny Foo Foo.

How am I ever going to ground a face like this.

Derrieres & Destiny

2008-11-14T12:36:00.000-08:00

Well I've been on vacation for an entire week now and I have yet to have anything to show for it. I continue my escapades on the interview trail in sunny California again next week. But until that time, I sit around all day and wait for the Hunny Bunny to come home so I can rub her belly.

However, on an unrelated note...a couple of weeks ago I jumped ship to California again for a couple of days. This time to Monterey. It was a pretty awesome place. It was cold and foggy the second day but lots scenery to take it. The main reason I was there was to present my research on bladder cancer. I got to make a giant poster, dress up in my monkey suit, and answer questions to enquiring Urologists. It was a blast. The atmosphere was a lot of fun. All the people I worked with over the summer were in attendance so it was good shooting the breeze and catching up. The best part was the "open bar" on opening night. All the kids from a very prestigious residency were a little tipsy. Hopefully I won brownie points with that crowd because due to their shenanigans, I may have alienated myself from all the other programs there (sigh). I doubt this fact since I saw everyone else hitting the bottles of wine pretty hard so they probably won't remember anything that transpired that night. Doctors are funny drinkers (chuckle).

With all of those stories aside there was basically only one reason why I went to Monterey. It wasn't to boost my resume, network with the Big Wigs of Urology, or even beg on my knees in front of multiple residency directors for a spot in their programs. Although I did all of these things that weekend, I had a bigger quest to perform. A quest to visit the one and only, Pebble Beach. I get goosebumps just thinking about this place. Tiger, Jack, Arnold...the history of that course is incredible. My hotel was a mere 5 miles from the course. As soon as I unpacked I ran downstairs, hopped in a taxi and headed towards the course. As we spiraled up the hill, the fog began to set in. I thought of Tiger's US Open while he hit shot after shot in the fog. I was giggling in the taxi cab. As I hopped out of the cab I took it all in. The smell of damp grass, the Rolex clocks scattered about, and yes...the Asian tourists (seriously, they are everywhere with their Nikon cameras and oversized visors). I started off down the 18th fairway. As I got to the tee box, one image sat out in my mind and I had to do my best to replicate it.

I'm actually crying as I finish this post. It was so beautiful. Think about it. My butt has touched the same place Nicklaus' butt has touched. It almost makes us soul mates. Or better yet...Blood Brothers, bound by the same love of striking a pose on old wooden fences. I love you Jack. That was truly incredible. One day I will be back. And next time I'm taking my clubs. I will sell off my Best Man Badge if i have to in order to afford the $500 greens fees. But I will be back because my derriere longs for yours Jack...

Saving The Day

2008-10-15T20:48:00.000-07:00

It was a busy weekend for The Hunny Bunny and I. We shipped ourselves off to magnificent West Point, NY for an exclusive "destination wedding". This wedding was unique, considering the fact the the Bride and Groom met at our wedding nearly three years ago. Needless to say, I take all the credit. As you can imagine we were both part of the bridal party. After all the hype, the weekend did not start out on the right foot. For starters, our flight was cancelled without our knowledge. Leaving us to find plane tickets the day we were supposed to leave. This never happens to be a good financial option in the middle of a "recession". I went ahead and took the difference out of the wedding gift we got the Bride and Groom. Which actually made it so they owe us money.

The weekend continued on a very similar note. The bachelor party that at one time was under my complete control was somehow relinquished when I was flying over the state of Ohio. I was informed the plans I made had been changed the minute I landed in NYC. Thankfully, this worked out in a positive note since it turned out to be the shortest bachelor party in history. The Groom was two sheets to the wind in exactly 86 minutes. This prompted an immediate cancellation of all festivities and a return to the hotel to tuck the poor guy in.

The wedding was great. Very formal...very impressive. There were Sabers and everything (not the prehistoric beast, but the sword-like thingy). Good times...Noodle Salad.

However, this weekend also brought me in touch with an old friend from high school. We had fallen out of communication somewhere in undergrad due to his incessant lying and inability to grow up. He had become the epitome of the Peter Pan Syndrome mixed with a touch of Anitsocial Personality and a pinch of Traumatic Brain Injury Induced Psychosis. This bright chap was also a groomsman. Which means I would likely need his help throughout the weekend. Let me tell you, I've had an easier time training wolverines in the Appalachian Mountains than getting this guy to help me.

The weekend came down to one defining moment. Peter Pan had one responsibility all weekend. His job was to return one rental car the day after the wedding just prior to his trip out of the state. This would leave one matching rental car for the Bride and Groom to return themselves en route to their honeymoon in Paris and Rome. At face value, this would leave a novel bystander to believe this is a relatively easy task. Pack rental care with your stuff, insert keys, drive to airport, return keys, flee the country...simple.

Well the next morning I was awakened by a frantic Groom. With his virginity a thing of the past, he had only one concern. That was, there were no keys to his rental car. I stumbled downstairs to offer my assistance. We looked everywhere. We searched the groomsman's rooms from sink to ceiling. We turned the tuxedos inside out with no avail. We were then left with 2 options. Tow the car to the airport (a mere 1.5 hours away) or have a locksmith make a new key. I made the call and spent the next two hours watching someone break into a 2009 Escalade. As I waited, I continued to call said groomsman to ask where he had put the keys in case we overlooked them somewhere...somehow. This however was a moot point since now we had paid $300 dollars to gain access to the car.

The ensuing part of the trip is what irritated me the most. The Bride and Groom so kindly let us hitchhike to the same airport in our hot-wired rental car. En route, finally the groomsman returned our call. And just as any antisocial would do given his predicament...he lied, placed blame on an innocent party, and went on the defensive that anyone could make such an accusation that he somehow screwed up. As we pulled into the rental car lot terrified of paying another $200 in lost key fees, we scrambled for any excuse that might help us avoid the infraction. But to our surprise the manager informed us that this was unnecessary. Unnecessary because our keys were turned in hours before our arrival with the other rental car. As everyone else in our party gasped...I could do nothing but laugh. Not because it was funny, but because I wasn't surprised. Peter Pan had struck again.

With the weekend now far behind us, I'm going to go ahead and take all the glory of holding the grooms hair back as he prayed to the porcelain gods, keeping tabs on Peter Pan for 98% of the weekend (the remaining 2% was nearly disastrous but that's neither here nor there), finding a locksmith, and for no fee at all...fixed the Brides new camera just prior to them boarding their plane to Europe. I think it is only fitting that I wore the same badge as Dupree as the reigning Best Man (BM) of the Decade.

In case you are interested. The badge of honor Dupree so honorably is holding in the movie clip was worn by me the day of the wedding. And I must say...after my Oscar winning performance, it was well deserved.

Shake, Rattle, & Role

2008-07-29T19:57:00.000-07:00

This post comes live from Los Angeles, CA. I've been out here for 4 weeks now brown-nosing like its going out of style. I am currently "auditioning" for a rather large conglomerate hospital (save that topic for another day). So far it has been an incredible experience. From the pre-operative holding area I can look out the window and see the HOLLYWOOD sign.

My drive to work entails a scenic drive past Echo Park and Downtown LA, home to the building that gets blown to shreds in Independence Day. I'm actually presently surprised on how fast they were able to rebuild it after the film. It's huge!

Anywho. Before I get back to the books, it was an exciting day. The largest earthquake to hit a populated area of southern California in 14 years hit LA today. 5.4 on the Richter scale. I happened to be in the Operating Room assisting on a prostatectomy. It didn't last very long but the entire hospital shook. It was crazy. After all the shaking stops, your equilibrium is thrown off. Feels just like you stepped off a boat and you have a bad case of the sea-legs. Funny feeling. It was also interesting operating in a hospital that will be closing in a month to move into a new and improved building that is more "earthquake stable".

Well I'm safe. And I learned an important lesson. If an earthquake should occur in the middle of a surgery...just keep operating while listening to Tom Petty's hit single Free Falling* and act like your not impressed. Nobody seemed to care when I announced that it was my first earthquake. I guess I'll just keep it to myself next time.

*The song came on shortly after the earthquake. I couldn't help but chuckle at the irony.

Immaculate Conception*

2008-06-29T18:17:00.000-07:00

Well fellow readers it has been a while since I last posted. It has been a roller coaster year. First, I almost died...sort of. I will save that story for another time. But let us just say that I wasn't able to use my left arm for a period of 8 weeks. It made it very difficult to put on shirts, tie my shoes, let alone examine patients. Second, MarkyV returned from Iraq, if I wasn't married and he wasn't getting married...well I will just stop there. So it goes without saying...it has been an eventful year.

Well somewhere...somehow something changed. I wasn't the only one who was sick. I was on the mend but now, the Hunny Bunny was sick. She was nauseous, getting headaches. We thought it was just a rough bout of allergies but one Home Pregnancy Test later...we learned that someone was up to something!

Now I am sure you are thinking the same thing I was about 4 weeks ago. How did this happen? Yes we were taking all the right steps to ensure that a little bambino/bambina was not in our immediate future...but then my wife told me. There was a 1 week period where her prescription lapsed (dumb pharmacists) and theoretically we could have conceived.

Well, according to our calculations we must be 10 weeks along. We were guided to a local OB/GYN who everyone seems to adore. We talked shop, my overall disdain for the field of OB/GYN and my subsequent 6 weeks of misery, as well as a little Birds & the Bees. Well she ensued to describe to us what the baby looks like at 10 weeks. Small...about the size of a Gummy Bear. I was so excited. I love Gummy Bears! Well we turned on the ultrasound and this is what we saw....

Apparently, my definition of a Gummy Bear was waaaaay off. I was staring face to face with my Baby to be! We were 17 weeks pregnant...I nearly wet my pants I was so excited! My Baby was waving right at us. I felt like it** was taunting us...saying I've been here the entire time (Something I could see myself doing, so I know it's my kid)! Which leads us to the entire "Immaculate" title. "Allegedly", when the Baby was conceived, we were on birth control the entire time. The whole 99.9% effective claim is apparently accurate, it just happens that we were the 0.1%. No complaints here though. Although I will consider a hefty lawsuit to the birth control companies to help pay for this Baby's college education.

I can't believe that I am going to be Daddy and we couldn't have planned better timing. When we first found out about a baby was on the way, I looked at my schedule and realized, after December my life is a vacation with the occasional visit to clinic to pretend to be a doctor. I will have literally months to spend with my Baby and Baby's Momma before I have to actually start working next July.

It's incredible what the next few months are going to bring but with the Hunny Bunny at my side we can tackle anything. In just a couple of weeks we will start the feel the Baby move! I'm in heaven. The only hard part at this point and time is picking a name. We decided against anything common, but we won't go as far to name our child after a monkey in the zoo. Any thoughts from my loyal fans? You have until approximately December 4th to come up with something convincing!

All this commotion has made me sleepy. Its time for a well earned nap as I dream about my cute little baby too-be swimming around in its own pee...

*Yes, I said Conception, not Reception. I look nothing like Terry Bradshaw.
**The Sex is TBA. You have to wait 3 more weeks before you know the answer. Until then, it's gender neutral references.

Baby Face

2008-05-01T22:37:00.000-07:00

OK enough is enough. In the past week one patient reported to a resident that I looked like I was 12 years old. Today a nurse guessed that I was 19 years old. This is getting to a be a little absurd. I think it may be time to bring back the Psyc Beard in order to convince people around me that I have indeed graduated from high school. This is nuts, none of my crazy patients on Pyschiatry thought I was a teenager. Granted one did think I was a Cosmonaut. But I still think you have to be 21 in order to be one of those.

Dream On

2008-02-21T20:42:00.001-08:00

So I'm not one to watch Okra, but the Hunny Bunny sent me this video. This guy is great. He has a wonderful insight to life we can all learn from. Fact of the matter is he is dying and you wouldn't know unless he told you. Take the 10 minutes to watch it. You can thank me later.

And you thought Ah Jota couldn't be serious for 5 minutes!

What's Good for the Goose is Good for the Gander

2008-02-18T19:28:00.000-08:00

Well life took a sudden turn for the comedic today. After 6 weeks of wanting to pull my hair out from dealing with hormonal women all day long, I headed off to the Psych Ward at the city's old county hospital. It has a comfy 70 bed inpatient facility...compared to 7 beds over at the University (cough). I had mixed feelings for this rotation, I heard the hours were good but I was concerned the Crazies were gonna make me...well...crazy. This could still possibly happen but D-rock, Beez, and I all decided that at least we'll have great stories come the end of the next 6 weeks.

I was assigned my attending today. A fun british-accented bloake from Britland. He seems to have a great sense of humor (probably a trait I should polish dealing with my patients so I don't become one). We made our rounds on a couple of patients which proved comical. One patient had actually created a website about a made up corporation he belongs too (I'm not crazy and I can't pull something like that off).

We completed our rounds downstairs and headed to the 5th floor. As we entered into the East Wing a female walked by us and I felt something unexpected. No, it wasn't an overwhelming wave of emotions to help those mentally ill and in need. It was a hand. On my BUTT. Yes, my loyal friends I had been goosed! By a female patient! Within my first 2 hours of being on the unit! That has to be some sort of record. At that moment I didn't know what to do...or to say. I was speechless. We headed to the nurses desk to see if there were any open rooms. My attending and the head nurse went back and forth about an over the top female patient who had tried to escape the day prior. My attending began to fill me in on her story on how she had confessed to Campus Health that she had asked her college roommate to "blow her brains out" with a shotgun. She fled the scene and was chased across campus by the campus police. He then pointed out that we walked by said female on our way in.

As he mentioned this I sheepishly remarked "We've already been acquainted". He looked at me with a confused glare. "She goosed me on the way in", I told him.

"You mean, she grabbed your $%$?".

"Pretty much."

He laughed and we told the nurse of her shenanigans and we were on our way. We received a phone call about 5 minutes later from the nurse. The patient was now concerned that I might sue her. If my wife has her way...I might. I learned a lot today. Crazy people will do anything. Throw poop, bite the nurses, and of course touch your butt. Let this be a lesson to both you and me. We better be on our toes for the next 6 weeks.

Labor & Delivery Shoutout

2008-01-27T20:32:00.000-08:00

For the past six weeks I have been tortured on "Labor and Delivery". Part of my OB/GYN experience of medical school. I think it is an understatement when I say that I have seen better days. I'm not saying I haven't been learning. The crew of residents are really enthusiastic about teaching. But I guess the entire "Birthing Process" is much more graphic than I had imagined in my head. For months I had been arguing with The Hunny Bunny about delivering our own children. The past 3 weeks cured me of that desire. I can only watch a child's head being squeezed into oblivion and mom lose a half a liter of blood so many times. Trust me on this one.

But not all three weeks were a waste. We had a patient come onto our floor from Globe, AZ in labor. After a quick ultrasound we determined that the baby was "breech". In simple terms, the baby was upside down. Now once upon a time, delivering a breech baby vaginally was not recommended by a bunch of doctors much smarter than you. But after a few stiff drinks in 2006, they changed their mind. So for this brave lady, it was go time. To the OR we went. As the epidural went in, the room filled up like a Phoenix Suns home game. The contractions were coming and the fun ensued. Everyone assumed their positions. Bees and I both grabbed a leg to help her into the lithotomy position.

I want to mention at this time that I had front row seating to one of the coolest things I have ever seen. A bouncing baby boy entering the world Balls First. Words cannot express my jealousy. When the kid was halfway out, he had a drop in heart rate. An ultrasound machine slammed into my leg and 2 residents crammed my personal space. I was having trouble doing my only assigned job. Holding that right leg up. The ultrasound was reassuring and after a couple more pushes, a lot of screaming, and one giant terd from the baby...HE WAS OUT!!!

Dad was eccentric. He was jumping around giving high fives thanking everyone for their help. Mom was exhausted and with little strength she had she uttered the following:

Whoever was holding my right leg...You did a great job.

I'm not gonna lie. I felt special. It was one of the few moments of the past 3 weeks that a really truly enjoyed. At least I can go ahead and cross OB/GYN off my list as a possible career choice. Lets hope I can stave off insanity for the second half of this experience. I'll just have to pray that I rack up a couple more shout outs from my patients.

The Big Show

2008-01-04T16:26:00.000-08:00

**I was browsing through my old archives from back in the day. This little ditty made me smile. Happy New Year boys and girls. More stories to come...

I can't believe the month of October is nearly over. On top of that. I can't believe I just finished 5 weeks of surgery. I have to admit it has been a blast. The hours are long, but bearable. I'm not a complete zombie as I was expecting. I've worked with some interesting characters and seen some amazing things.

The past 2 weeks I've been on the Surgical Oncology team. Our given team name is the "Eagle Team". "Look up and we will poop in your eyes!" You know the rotation is fun when you have your own team name. This week our intern has been gone so myself and the other medical student had to step up our games and pick up the slack. Looking back, I think we did pretty good. Good enough to get our picture taken as a matter of fact...let me explain.

We had a huge anticipated surgery on Monday. It was a big liver resection for a tumor of unknown origin. This bad boy was huge on the CT scan. Our whole team was excited to take it out. We hit the OR and it was intense. The head of the Surgery Dept. was on double red alert to come and help us take it out. Fortunately, I was available so his presence was unneccesary. It was such a huge occasion we called Medical Photography to come check this gumba out and document this monstrosity.

It was awesome. Not only did we get a great photo, but we documented my "New Hotness" in the operating room. Eat your heart out ladies...I'm Taken!

Let's hope I can knock the dust off and get back to business when OB/GYN starts up next week after this 3 week break of complete mindlessness.

Jailhouse Jock

2007-12-04T19:38:00.000-08:00

Well after all of these weeks of not blogging...I'm still in the midst of Urology. I'm in private practice now. AKA, The Big League. It's all about service with a smile here. It seems patient care is much better in private practice. Doctors give out their personal cell phone numbers, return calls the same day, wear gloves during digital rectal exams, etc. Needless to say, it has been quite the experience.

Well today we had a bit of a lull (something I haven't experienced in awhile since these doctors avoid double and triple booking their clinic hours). We had a nice 30 minute break between patients since we were moving early this afternoon. While I was sitting around playing "Jawbreaker" on my phone, an old patient of...let's call him Dr. Alda dropped in. Why Dr. Alda you ask? It's because this doctor's voice reminds me of that dude from M*A*S*H*.

But I digress. This patient who has not been to the office in nearly 4 years lines up at the window and loudly embarks on the following disertation:

"Does the doctor have any appointments for this week. I leave on a long vacation with my wife on Monday and I was interested in getting a prescription for on of those PENAL INJECTIONS."

Needless to say I was in the back snickering. I couldn't believe this guy was going on about this with a full lobby of people behind him. Since no doctor in his or her right mind dishes out a prescription for a patient he hasn't seen in years, this guy was meeting some resistance from the nurse. The situation escalated. When a man wants a "Penal Injection" and doesn't get it...apparently they get angry.

I put my phone away and made my way to the front window. I looked the guy right in the eye and expressed that if he wanted a "Penal Injection" he would have to meet me at the local jail at which point I would be able to help him. However, if he wanted to recieve a "Penile Injection" he could have a seat and we would be with him shortly. At this point the patients face turned bright red and he turned to the nurse, quitely apologized, and timidly asked for directions to the prison.

**Ok the last paragraph didn't exactly transpire that way. But he did say PENAL, I did giggle, and he didn't get his injections. Looks like its going to a very uneventful trip for that poor bloake.

Quote of the Day

2007-11-05T16:41:00.000-08:00

"I don't know whats wrong with that guy. I just stuck my finger in his butt and he's complaining that I want to put a camera in his penis!"

Oh, I missed the life of a Urologist. What makes this quote of the day funny is the resident who said it was completely serious. I'm off to 6 weeks of Urology. So far I'm getting more sleep than General Surgery which is always a sign of better things. Never fear readers, I'll keep the quotes coming!

DOA

2007-09-30T09:54:00.001-07:00

Just finished my first night of Trauma Call. I stood on my feet for approxamately 22 hours straight. I got 45 minutes of sleep, worked a 28 hour shift, and I currently can't spell my own name.

Apparently AK-47's are the new rage in this lovely city. I walked right into a bloodbath at 0530 yesterday morning. Five gang bangers decided to have target practice on each other while being strung out on coke, weed, and Jim Beam. I enjoyed playing in your abdomen's fella's.

But it was all made worth it at 0330 this morning when drawing blood from a femoral artery of a male pt. Right before the needle went in we heard the following words:

PLEASE don't mess up my BIKINI LINE!!!

I had to leave the room I was laughing so hard. He had just dumped his boyfriend...who apparently didn't take it too well. You can do a lot of damage with an empty beer bottle, especially after it breaks.

People in this town are crazy. I need to go to bed before I end up like them.

Top Reasons Why I Will Miss Family Medicine

2007-09-21T15:43:00.000-07:00

Well today was my last official day as a "Family Practitioner In Training". I have mixed feelings as we finished up today. There were somethings that I loved (see below) and some things that I just couldn't stand. All in all, if you twisted my arm hard enough I can't completely rule out Family Med because of the sweet lifestyle. I mean, when the Hunny Bunny and I start multiplying like actual rabbits and not just having cute nicknames...it would be nice to actually watch my Little Bunny Foo-Foos grow up. These are things you need to think about if your in my position. But, not to digress here are some of my highlights of Family Medicine:

Telling patients they don't need antibiotics. Just take a little Gatorade, some Ibuprofen, and call us if anything changes.

My Doctor telling me to grab some samples of Flonase for a patients BPH. When I corrected him, he replied "Tell the patient to stick it up his butt...at least he won't get nasal polyps."

Running With Scissors.

Half Day Wednesdays.

Sleep-In Thursdays.

Patients constantly asking me if I have graduated High School. WAIT. That was definitely not a positive.

Telling a Nurse that next week we would practice her "Shapes and Colors" since she seemed to have her numbers down.

BBQ at the Doctors house and pretending that I too was a Doctor.

Free Drug Rep Lunches every single day. I really noticed the difference in my bank account over the past 6 weeks.

Getting home at 5PM.

Studying was not necessary or even a distant thought in my mind for 6 weeks.

Seeing a urine specimin that looked like grapejuice.

Almost convincing a nurse to give that urine sample to D-Rock and telling him it was grapejuice.

Calling out Drug Reps when they made completely erroneous claims for a drug.

A doctor coveting my Ties.

Free drug samples.

Selling my free drug samples at the Swap Meet.

Meeting a mother of a girl I mistakingly dated in High School. AWKWARD.

Free Drug Rep Pens and Paper.

Looking really smart when the CNA's asked really simple questions like: "What does BPH stand for?"

Giving Rectal Exams....Psssssyyyycccc!!!

Having a 70 year old woman say to me, "If I was only 50 years younger again"

Being invited to the office Christmas Party in September

40 hour work week.

As you can see. The last 6 weeks had it's moments. But now, its time to get serious. I start Surgery in 3 days. Orientation starts at 6:30 in the morning. I'll be learning how to suture on a rat first thing in the morning. That sounds pretty cool if it wasn't so darn early in the morning. I miss Half Day Wednesdays already. Tear.

Running With Scissors

2007-08-23T22:10:00.000-07:00

Since Peas was irate from my lack of blogging...I thought I would update the blog at least once this month. Life has been good on Family Medicine. I get out at 5 on most days and there is even "Half-Day-Wednesdays" where I get to play golf in the afternoons. Basically, for the last two weeks I've been spoiled and I get to keep it up for the next four weeks.

Today we were extremely busy. Patients coming out our ears. I had a great patient. Vietnam Vet, funny, old, etc. You know they're cool (or weird) when they are joking around when you are about to give them a Rectal Exam (or as I told him, The One Finger Salute). I'm not sure if I offended him with that joke or not yet. Anyways, his face was covered in Seborrheic Keratosis as demonstrated by this old man's back below (thanks Mayo Clinic):

They were of varying sizes. Some were small and a couple of them looked like a ferret pooped on the man's face. In other words...they were huge. Apparently the protocol for these bad boys is you just cut them off with a pair of scissors and watch them bleed. Seems savage enough to me. So the doctor showed me once and then gave me the scissors and I went to town. I chopped off about 15 little terds off his face. I went through seven or eight 4x4 inch gauze pads just covered in blood. The patient joked he was going to need a transfusion at the end of the procedure. I was actually considering it as a real option. I wonder what was more terrifying for this poor guy, The Vietcong or Ah Jota weilding a Battle Ax. My gut tells me it was the latter.

I often wonder who in their right mind would let a third year medical student jam a pair of razor sharp scissors in their face and be totally cool with blood pouring down their cheeks. I guess there has to be a first time for everyone...but you can bet your rear-end no med student will ever be lunging at me wtih a sharp metal object. I'd make sure to impale them before they ever got to me. I can't wait till I get to surgery so I can do this stuff everyday.

More Than Meets The Eye...*

2007-08-13T17:39:00.000-07:00

Last friday I finished six weeks of pediatrics. In all honesty, I had a lot of fun. The doctors were great, the residents were fun, and the kids were just hilarious. I think it's the only time I'll be able to get away with tickling a patient during a physical exam. Anywhere else I would have a sexual harassment suit slapped on me so fast my head would spin. But it wasn't all fun and games. Sometimes the rotation was BIG and it was UGLY...let me explain.

I was on call on a Saturday and I came stumbling into the wards right on time. While I was walking in I noticed an ambulance parked outside...curious. I went in and we were busy. Admits from the night before and two just arriving with me, one of which via the ambulance parked outside. There are only two residents who work the weekends, so obviously they were busy. I decided to help out I would admit one of the patients that just walked through the door. The residents were grateful for the help. But just as I was about to turn the corner, one of them grabbed me and told me the one thing that any medical student dreads..."The caretaker is a Transgender". I wasn't too sure what that word meant, but from his tone, I knew that I was going to have my hands full as I entered the patients room.

I shuffled into the room and next to our tiny little nursing tech stood a massive he/she. I walked up to take the history as I stood in his/her shadow that stretched across the room. I guess the thing that made this entire experience so difficult was I couldn't convince myself of this persons sex. It makes it hard when I'm not sure whether to address a person as "Sir" or "Ma'am". His giant stature, long hair, and 1970 verbage that he rambled off to me suggested this was just a large male hippy. However, the shaved legs and obtuse chest hinted at the opposite gender. It's been a long time since I have been that confused. It was kinda like watching the beginning of Transformers where the crappy little Camaro changed into an awesome fist throwin', butt-kickin', protector of the universe giant robot (Robit, if you are speaking the Queen's English). But instead of this beat up Camaro changing into something awesome, it turned into an Oldsmobile...or something of that nature.

Maybe the resident was wrong and was just equally as confused and just wanted me to be as lost as he was. Who knows. In the end it really doesn't matter. He/she was as helpful as he/she could have been. I was able to get a complete history with very little holes about a patient who threw food and elbows at the nurses and later in the week tried to escape from the hospital. I love it when cartoons and subsequent movies can teach you lessons about life. You can just hear the theme song now...

*This post was not meant to offend. I apologize ahead of time for any mental anguish my jabberings might have caused.

Tag Team

2007-07-19T21:03:00.000-07:00

Well I know I've been in school for almost three weeks now and haven't mentioned a single thing about what my third year of medical school has been like. For those of you out of the loop, I started with Pediatrics. So far it has been awesome. I'm on outpatient so we've had SWEET 9-5 hours the entire time. It has been glorious. On top of that...the doctors are great. Just about all of them have a great sense of humor and love helping you out. The best part about it is they are fully aware that this is our first rotation so they cut us a lot of slack...sometimes a little too much (it makes me worry for when I hit my surgery rotation in a couple of months).

Anyways. I'm sure you're just dying for a fun anecdote from 3OPC (that's the outpatient clinic in case you thought I had joined a gang). Well sometimes when it's slow Beez and I team up and see a patient together to kill some time...a "Tag Team" if you will. Well today we had a pretty decent case. After we suited up...we came up with this....

Yes on clinic days we wear the same underwear. And since it was Thursday, we wore his colors. The kids really like it when we dress up. The doctors were reluctant when we came in all oiled up, but I think it's grown on them. But, back to the task at hand. This is how the kid presented:

Our 14 year old came in after he had been diagnosed with pink eye 5 days ago. He has been taking his antibiotics as scheduled and his eye is now worse. The discharge from his eye is clear and his sclera is "super-red" (more red than normal). Now he complains that it feels like something is in it, pain with movement, and photophobia. Well Beez and put together a great workup and we were pretty confident that it was a viral conjunctivitis and were ready to send him on his way.

Well the after we were pimped in the conference room, we had a little work to do. We went back in to see the patient and the doctor was convinced that this wasn't a virus. Now we concerned that this kid had Glaucoma, Corneal Abrasion, or Herpetic Keratitis (Yes I know this is a virus, but a little more serious than the one's we were thinking of). In a matter of five minutes we were on the phone with Opthamology trying to get this poor kid seen IMMEDIATELY!! Apparently he could be blind before the morning. So much for sending him home with a pat on the back and a note telling him to put a cold compress on it. Samsonite! We were way off!

Maybe our matching underwear was on too tight. Or maybe we still have a lot to learn (I like to think that it's the latter becuase I really like Killer Bee Thursday). But apparently the "practice" of medicine takes a lot of practice (that was clever!). I wish someone would have told me that this isn't as easy as watching an episode of Scrubs. I guess this Tag Team still has some kinks to work out before our Pay-Per-View special.

Aurora, Ohio?

2007-07-04T22:48:00.001-07:00

Well I'm off to a wedding this weekend. Let me be the first to tell you my disappointment. When I first heard the name of the town it was going to be in, I was psyched. We were going to Aurora! The breeding ground of the 1992 smash hit comedy, Wayne's World! My heart was set on seeing all the sights from the movie and walking where the voice of Shrek walked. I was even ready to head to this restaurant to give this a try...

BUT...since I'm not very good with my abbreviations, OH apparently means Ohio...NOT Illinois. We're going to a completely different state! My hopes and dreams were crushed when I came to this realization. I was so frustrated I even looked up how many cities in America with this name there actually were...the answer is 8 if you're curious. FYI, it's also my grandma's name. But I had already ruled her out because I was pretty sure the wedding wasn't going to be at her house. To my knowledge, she wasn't even invited to this wedding...that could have been awkward.

Nonetheless, the only thing keeping hope alive is seeing my wife as a bridesmatron this weekend (did you know that's what they're called when they're married?). If you answered yes to this question...YOU'RE A LIAR! I can't wait to see her walk down the isle in a Pepto-Bismol Pink bridesmatron dress. Whatever stomach ache I still have from getting the state wrong is going to cured in an instant when I see that dress on Saturday. But, if that doesn't work...I'll still download Bohemian Rhapsody onto my iPod to help get me through the weekend...

Here I come Ohio!

Study Crazies

2007-06-01T22:51:00.000-07:00

First, I apologize for the lack of effort on my blog...wait. No I don't. I'm stuck in the library for 14 hours a day. Cut me some slack...Hyena's. Being cooped up in a room with Beez that long can really do a number on a person's psyche. Unfortunately, that psyche is mine. I have just about reached the threshold for total brain capacity. I noticed that in order to make space for all this new information, a gynormous vien has grown on the side of my forehead. I named it Tommy after UofA Alumn Tom Tolbert:

My vein looks just like him. Trust Me. Where was I? Oh yes. The study crazies. From being cramped in a study room all day memorizing facts like Drucunculus gives you an inflammation and necrosis of your skin after drinking contaminated water really leaves me at a loss of entertainment. So I think my brain has started to compensate by throwing in random "hallucinations" during the day. For example, earlier today whilst studying a Care Bear drove by in his cloud car playing with a Yo-Yo and not wearing a seatbelt. Then a leprechaun wandered in and offered to play me in a game of Uno. I humbly denied. I was in the middle of studying Antibiotics. Then Beez farted. Wait, I didn't imagine that. It occurs roughly every 15 minutes on a daily basis.

Needless to say, the lack of sleep, toxic gas, useless facts have taken a toll on my grey matter. Time to recover. Leepy Leep time for Ah Jota. T-minus 12 days kiddies.

Here's Busey

2007-05-10T22:41:00.001-07:00

If you have been a little out of the loop, I'll use this time to fill you in. This past week began the awful summer of Boards Study. In actuality it could be worse. So I'll hold my tongue about complaining...for now...

Anyways, most of the stuff I'm going over is material we have covered before. But every once in awhile little tid bits will pop up that you have never seen before. My favorite thus far came today. I was studying Neurology and found myself rolling on the floor in laughter after reading about " Kluver Bucy Syndrome ". The notes stated (and I quote) "The patient exhibits: Hypersexuality, Docility, Hyperorality". Hilarious!

But after I thought about it, I pondered that this definition was implying something more. And then it hit me. Kluver Bucy is just a play on words about Gary Busey! Somebody just described Gary Busey, made it a Syndrome and then gave it a name that sounded like his! Never in a million years would I have come up with something that witty. Kudos to whomever came up with this...My hat's off to you.

To prove my point. Here is a short clip from Entourage with Gary Busey the Artist. You can see his Hyper-oral tendencies come out in just a mere 20 seconds!

Out & In

2007-05-02T14:58:00.000-07:00

Well last week marked a significant event in the history of our little town of Tucson. In-n-Out opened its doors for the first time to this lovely little city. It took me a little over a week, but I finally made it over there. It couldn't have come at better timing. I needed something to cheer me up after being dominated by a Medical Microbiology Final.

While standing in line we discussed the "Secret Menu" available to the public. Now I had heard of such menu but personally I had never ordered from it...maybe I was afraid I wouldn't be able to handle it. But Beez urged me to try "Animal Style" anyways. I oblidged and my, was I in for a treat. Somebody had actually found a way to make an In-N-Out hamburger more delicious. My tastebuds actually did an End-Zone dance, it was glorious. My ability to describe such a magnificent meal evades me. All I can say is you have to try one for yourself to know what my tongue is talking about.

Normally, my body has a ban on all fast food, but do to this wonderful new discovery...I might just have to partake like an animal every once in awhile. Looks like I'll have to buy some new pants to make room for my new hobby.

Library Man's Lyrics

2007-04-29T21:06:00.000-07:00

Earlier this weekend I had my Ipod on "Shuffle Mode" and this song came up. It's from Metallica's Reload album and it's called Low Man's Lyrics. It's an oldie but a goodie as we used to say as children. The lyrics were just depressing and inspirational enough for me to make it my Official Theme Song while studying for my Medical Microbiology Final.

The trash fire is warm
But nowhere safe from the storm
And I can't bear to see
What I've let me be
So wicked and worn

So as I write to you
Of what is done and to do
Maybe you'll understand
And you won't cry for this man
'Cause low man is due

Please forgive me

My eyes seek reality
My fingers feel for faith
Touch clean with a dirty hand
I touch the clean to the waste

After I thought about it for awhile I realized that it didn't quite fit me. So I decided to make my own version. It goes a little like this...

The Library is warm
But not from my Thyroid Storm
And I can't bear to see
What Beez has for Me
While I Study On The 3rd Floor

So as I write to you
Of what I Still Have To Do
Maybe you'll understand
And you won't laugh at this Mexitalimer
'Cause Ah Jota is due

Please Excuse Me....

My mind seeks what is itchy
My fingers scratch my A-noose
Touch my Mouth with a dirty hand
Enterobius on my Scotch-Tape

Happy Birthday...To Me!!

2007-04-19T17:40:00.000-07:00

I celebrated twenty-four years on planet Earth this week. My favorite thing about birthdays is PRESENTS!!! I received the funniest present thus far in the mail today. It looks a little like this...

If you don't get it...You need to start watching Arrested Development. I'll give you a little background. Tobias is an Analyst and Therapist...an Analrapist. But remember, "It's not the spelling you should be worried about".

The Simple Life

2007-04-19T17:08:00.000-07:00

With sadness in my heart, I have to report that today was my last day following Dr. C. It was tough...I'll admit that. Every patient I saw, I had to choke back the tears (OK, not quite). But, I definitely didn't hold back any laughter. I probably erupted one too many times after Dr. C's jokes in front of a patient. The first when he referred to the Cystoscope as the TV and invited a patient's son to come watch TV with us (while we looked for cancer in his father's bladder...it was funny to me!). The second happened to be when a patient mentioned that intercourse had become "better" (less painful) since the last visit. Then mentioned her husband had been away for eight weeks on business. I'm sure you're already laughing so I'll just leave that one alone for now. And for the record...you people have dirty minds.

Anywho, it being my last day and all I felt obligated to buy Dr. C a gift. It's the least I could do since he put up with my shenanigans for entire school year and never even complained. My friends can't even make it an entire day without complaining. I need new friends...tear.

Huh...Ok back on topic. What did I buy him you ask? Well to buy something for a "Doctor", one must think like a "Doctor"... and that's exactly what I did. I made a trip to Borders and purchased two books. Both being a series of books based on the TV Show, Hannah Montana. Now I know what you're thinking...and you're wrong. It was for his two daughters. The show (yes Billy Ray Cyrus is her father) is their favorite in the entire world. So Ah Jota comes through in down the stretch with 2 books that they didn't have yet...BOOOYAAAH. To add to my brown-nosing, I purchased a bottle of kosher wine for him and his wife. What took me back (and simultaneously points to Dr. C's awesomeness) was he didn't even care about the wine. He was fascinated by the books. That's all he talked about as I took my final stroll down the hallway.

I love it when people enjoy the simple things in life. Something I should do a little more often. But at least this little adventure proved 2 things. 1) I'm good a buying presents and 2) I'm extremely good at sucking up. There...that was simple.

Random Motion

2007-04-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

Since the Hunny Bunny refers to me as being one of the most random people in the world, I thought what happened this morning was pretty apropos. I had to drag myself out of bed early this morning to take the "Mock Boards". It was no fun at all since I stayed up too late last night watching Blood Diamond (A great flick if you haven't seen it. I liken it to a cross between Hotel Rwanda and Apocalypto). Anyways, after nearly falling asleep a good five times during the exam, I stumbled into the library after I picked up some coffee. Bees just happened to be checking the Intraweb for the Suns score and what time Tiger teed off today (If you were not aware that it is Masters Week...consider yourself on double-secret probation).

Where was I?? That's right. We were standing at the computer talking about what to do with the rest of the day and one of the Librarians approached us. She kinda reminds me of the Lunch Lady from Billy Madison (Mmmmm...Sloppy Joe's). She remarked to us, "Nice day today, you boys going to be playing golf this afternoon?" Strange I know, but all doctors I know play golf so I guess I can understand the stereotype. But she started giving us the 3rd degree on what type of golf balls we liked and which ones she thought were the best...then she invited us into her office. You know my parents taught me when awkward strangers invite you to go places and tell you they will give you something in return, you probably shouldn't listen and follow them around like a lost puppy. It's too bad I'm not a very good listener and curious like a cat (Hence my nickname, "Whiskers"). I guess I couldn't help myself. Librarians always seem so trustworthy and nice. Well as we entered her office we were immediately surrounded by golf balls. It was unbelievable. She lives on a golf course and just scavenges for these things every night. She was even anal enough to separate them out by brand, each brand had its own enormous busket. After Bees and I pulled ourselves together the librarian pulled out a couple of egg containers and filled up one for each of us and sent us on our way.

I doesn't get more random than that. Though I was confused, I sure was happy I walked away with a baker's dozen of slighly used Nike golf balls. Maybe my parents were wrong about strangers this whole time. I wonder how many other free gifts I've been missing out on all my life...

Aren't Angels Great?

2007-03-29T20:20:00.000-07:00

You know, I'm not one to judge. I don't mind hearing people out when they tell me about their "Beliefs". Even though I'm a little set in my ways, I enjoy learning something new every once in awhile. But sometimes it fascinates me what people have been taught over the years. At this point in my life I feel that I've heard my share of crazy ideas about how we got here, where we're going, and how did they get that delicious white paste inside of the Twinkie. But today in clinic, I heard a new little ditty I thought I would pass on to you. It goes a little like this:

Before we're born Angels come to visit us in the womb and teach us EVERYTHING we ever need to know. All the important stuff about how to act, pray, make good decisions, etc. But when we're born, obviously we don't appear to have all this information available (I mean babies can't even make it to the bathroom or say their own name...slackers). Sooo, something has to happen. Something magical. Well after we've been taught all we need to know, those ingenious Angels devised a method to cloud these memories allowing us when we're older to have those "Ah Ha" moments (or as the lay people like to say, an "Epiphany"). So, right before we're born those angels nestle up nice and close to us and SLAP US ACROSS THE FACE and then touch our upper lip leaving us with what we now know as a philtrum.

Hmmmm. You know. Once it's down on paper, it doesn't sound so far-fetched. Why don't you go ahead and disregard what I said to start. I think all of us can learn a little something from this. Angels are Awesome! I can't wait to meet one again. I just hope their not as violent in person.

My Tuition Money at Work

2007-03-22T21:54:00.000-07:00

You know, I pay quite a bit of money to go to medical school. The statistics I've heard is the average medical student is $100,000 in debt when they finish medical school. Craziness if you ask me. I've been trying to avoid that by living off a steady diet of government cheese. Probably one of the reasons I was pushing maximum density a couple of months ago. But sometimes I wonder if my money is being put to good use...

Let's explore this thought:

1) Pathology lab is taught in fancy new rooms with 10 plasma flat screens (1 TV per table). Considering this past week our professor admired my drawing of a cat while we were supposed to be looking at a slide of bacterial meningitis...I'm gonna go ahead and say that maybe 10 screens per room was a little overboard.

2) Frat Boy Invasion. Everytime I venture to the library to study, I'm stuck listening to some fratboy answer his cell phone. I could probably handle that every once in awhile if they weren't on the phone with their rich daddies and mommies convincing them they need to be wired a few more thousand of their inheritance so they can help pay for a kegger for their upcoming "Enchantment Under The Sea Party".

3) Last but not least. I was told in clinic today to watch Grey's Anatomy tonight (even though I was planning on watching it anyways). But that order was followed up by the statement, "Be prepared to be Pimped on it next week".

Now that I think about it, maybe I should have tried to get a few more scholarships for this endeavor. The thought of wasting someone else's money would make me a little less apprehensive when I point out example's such as these. But, I guess I can't complain too much. I was just planning on defaulting on my loans until I kick the bucket, then someone else gets stuck paying them back. Don't you wish you thought of that first?

A Lot Like Christmas

2007-03-15T10:29:00.000-07:00

In case you live on another planet and are reading this blog. The NCAA Tourney starts today. There is basketball on non-stop until the end of the weekend. It's one of the most glorious times of the year. I actually woke up crying (tears of joy). If you need me, I'll be on the couch...

Samson and the Barber

2007-03-14T11:21:00.000-07:00

Well on friday, the unthinkable to many happened. Not the fact that I passed all my exams (darn you if you thought that), but I made a trip to the barber shop. As I wove in and out of traffic, the mere thought of a haircut left me with that "funny feeling" you get in your stomach when your nervous. My hair had now become a glorious mane and my beard was now as noticeable as ever. I felt as if I could "wrastle" a lion, or better yet... a shirtless Montgomery all hopped up on caffeine, nicotine, slippy-flippy's, jelly stingers, trick sticks, bing bangs and flying willards (can you imagine?).

But as I sat down in the barber's chair with a tear in my eye, I uttered the un-utterable: "Let's take it down". As soon as I spoke what will live on as some of my most infamous words, I felt the life just leave me. My energy was zapped, my spunk exhausted, and my enthusiasm...extinguished. You know, it actually hurt when the scissors met my hair. Like it had become a part of me. My hair had symbolized Ah Jota manifested in wavy, black glory.

When I stood up from the chair I hardly recognized the person in the mirror. Though he was just as handsome as Ah Jota, he seemed to be roughly 5lbs the lighter (I later learned that was the amount of hair that was cut off). I missed of course my hair being blown in the summer breeze as well as it safely resting on the back of my neck as I walked towards my car. I feeling that won't be around for some time now.

But as the weekend passed, my new "Do" grew on me. The Hunny Bunny liked it as well as many of my friends, even though many were surprised to see that I parted with my locks. But then my view changed. Monday I ventured into the gym for a quick workout. Nothing to strenuous since I was still recovering from Midterms. But as I grabbed the weights off the rack, there was something different. Something....was....HEAVIER!! Never would I have thought that with my glorious hair my strength would leave me too! Weights I used to laugh at now took all my effort to lug around. It was horrendous. I remembered the story of Samson that I had been taught as a child. And though he was decieved by a woman, I was decieved by my own deludedness. Though I hope we don't suffer a similar fate (read the story) I know at least for now, my strength has left me. Montgomery comatose from Forget Me Now's would be a struggle for me to subdue.

But I have hope in better things. Daily workouts will get me back to my previous strength and the thought that my hair grows like crabgrass in the South Carolina summer cheers my soul. However, it wasn't all in vain...at least I'm cool while I kick back and enjoy my spring break. Remember, it takes very little strength to surf the internet and watch TV all day.

Hey Blinkin'

2007-03-02T10:47:00.000-08:00

With Midterms now in full force, I'll take a few minutes to share some of my thoughts with you. Midterms, of course can only mean one thing. No not the fact that I'm Cranky Ah Jota, or that I haven't slept in two weeks, or even that I waited in the lobby of the Emergency Room last night for 3 hours only to be told be 3 different physcians that it is "unethical" to equip me with a "caffeine-IV" to help get me through the next week. Though all those things are true, there is only one thing that truly captures the essence of Exam Time. That single thing is of course....FACIAL HAIR.

I'm sure you can remember what happened in September when I wandered the halls of the medical school posing as Adam Morrison. As glorious as that was, this set of exams needed a little bit of flavor. It needed something different, something spectacular, something that would turn heads, and of course make the Hunny Bunny cringe at the very site of me first thing in the morning.

Well yesterday it all came to fruition. I calmly etched a masterpiece onto my golden-brown complextion like a janitor resurfacing the ice with a Zamboni at a Tampa Bay Lightening game. As I stood peering into the mirror of our bathroom, I noticed the likeness to a very special person in our nation's history:

No it wasn't Blinkin'...I looked like Abe Lincoln!! Now I don't exactly look just like him. Obviously his beard his a little thicker, he's a little older and had a mild case of Marfan's Syndrome. But if Abe Lincoln stood here today minus a genetic defect and had just a touch of Mexitaliamerican to him...you would be staring at Ah Jota's doppleganger. Intriguing I know.

So with Midterms just a few days away, I can sleep calmly at night knowing that if exams don't go my way and this whole medical school thing doesn't "work out"...I'll always have a shot at The Presidency, abolishing slavery (again), or even getting my bearded face onto a piece of currency. Ahh, it never hurts to dream...

Cranky and Hungry (No More)

2007-02-26T15:01:00.001-08:00

Since all of you are still subject to Cranky Ah Jota, I thought I would complain just a little more this week. Last weekend after I returned home from church I noticed water all over the refrigerator when I grabbed a soda. When I investigated further I discovered that it had blown a fuse and no "refrigeration" had been taking place for a number of hours.

EVERY SINGLE ITEM in the freezer had been de-thawed by this point. Needless to say I was not a happy camper. All the food had to destroyed except for two items. I saved my skim milk which had now become cheese. I used it to dip my wheat thins in later that night during one of my study breaks. It was delicious!! Secondly, since I needed to cook dinner that night...I salvaged the thawed ham from the freezer. Being new to cooking an entire slab of ham, I pulled up a cooking show off the internet with some delicious cooking tips. In case you're wondering what to cook tonight or looking for a nice "study break" snack...maybe you should treat yourself to a nice bowl of Hot Ham Water. It's rather simple. All you need is 1) A Pot 2) A Ham 3) Some Water. Bring the water to a boil, toss in your ham and you have a mouthwatering concoction sure to leave your tastebuds screaming for more! Just watch and learn!

Stop Wasting My Time

2007-02-21T17:47:00.000-08:00

Well it's that wonderful time of year again...Midterms. A time where caffeine flows like wine, moustaches grow like weeds, and the refreshing daily shower is...well they're not quite daily anymore. Yeah, you guys no the drill. Ah Jota goes MIA for a number of weeks while he is replaced by "Cranky Ah Jota". Food doesn't taste as good but late night farting seems to even more hilarious than normal to this late-night imposter.

Anywho, some things just get under my skin. Especially things that are a complete waste of time. For instance. As I was studying my notes for Microbiology the other day, I came across this little ditty:

"Mycobacterium leperae is an acid-fast bacillus that cannot be grown in artificial media or tissue culture...it can only grow in the footpads of mice and armadillos."

ARMADILLOS?!?! Who cares?? When I'm studying until one in the morning about the effects of Leprosy, all I care about is making sure that I don't contract it (granted it did work out OK for Naaman). Why must you waste my time with information that is only useful while engaged in a game of Trivial Pursuit?

As you can tell I'm just cranky. Pending I don't contract Leprosy from class, one of the bums in the library, or an armadillo, I'll be back soon...

Valentine's Day

2007-02-14T14:49:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentine's Day to my minions. Personally I think I'm spending this Valentines Day in The Twilight Zone. First off, I slept through my alarm this morning. Wait. Thats nothing out of the ordinary. Let me start over...

First off, I spent the entire morning of classes learning about the vagina and disorders therein. I'm not sure if there is anything more disturbing than covering that subject matter on The Day of Cupids Birth. To make it even worse...those disorders were latter passed around in pathology lab....Gross.

After Micro Lab I ventured home and made a quick stop to buy the Hunny Bunny some roses. Nothing extravagant but I felt it was my duty. I'm normally not a "flower person" but since it has been such a long time (our wedding day) since I had sent flowers, I felt I was due. Well I got home and started trimming the roses and put them in vase. They looked beautiful. They were the same roses the Hunny Bunny had on our wedding day. But something was wrong. I could just sense it...Then I noticed it. ELEVEN ROSES!!!! What kind of flapdoodle is that? I paid for TWELVE roses and was totally gypped. If I had the time or the energy I would totally go back and complain. Oh well, I'll just hope the Hunny Bunny doesn't notice...or read this blog.

So as you can see, you and I are not in the same dimension right now. Wherever I am, I want to get back to reality. I hope it happens soon since we have reservations at a fancy Tucson restaurant tonight, named after the optimal temperature at which I store my wine. With that said, it's time to get dressed...

An Afternoon of Insolence

2007-02-08T18:07:00.000-08:00

I walked into clinic today and much to my surprise...no patients. I failed to realize that this Thrusday was "Surgery Day". Dr. C told me to come down to the OR and suit up. I happily ablidged. I spent the afternoon with Taj, one of the residents. He's a quiet guy but is really good about keeping me in the loop and doesn't mind me hanging around. Everything was going great until after we finished the first case...

Taj and I walked over to the recovery room and we were joined by my other "favorite" resident, Vladimir. As Taj charted he tried to spark some conversation with ol' Vladdy and it went a little like this:

Taj : Hey Vlad you remember Ah Jota right?
Vlad : Nope.
Ah Jota : Ummm, we've met before.
Vlad : You must not have done anything extrordinary for me to remember you by.
Ah Jota : EAT MY FARTS!!!!**

Who says that? I spent an entire afternoon with that punk and he has no recollection whatsoever of me. On top of that he tries to belittle me with his arrogance. If anyone is going to belittle anybody, it's going to be me! To add to the fire...this is what he said when we got back to the OR:

Vlad : Hey Ah Jota, why don't you run over there and get me that clip. And while you're at it...tuck your shirt in so you don't look like one of the nurse's.

Can you believe that! I couldn't begin to comprehend the egotism that just oozed from this guy. It was awful. It put a damper on my entire afternoon. I was worried that I too could succomb to being a punk like Vlad. But then I realized...I have glorious hair. No cheap immitations here. And this glorious hair keeps me far away from any conceitedness that could creep into my life. If you don't believe me...just ask the Hunny Bunny.

I guess next time I"m just have to be a little more "memorable" for our little Vladdy Boy. Maybe next time I'll put on a little song and dance for him, shine his shoes, or maybe even smile at him. And if all of that doesn't work, I may just have to pin him down and make him eat one of my farts. I'm glad I have all of you readers (and my hair) to help keep me humble. Becuase the last thing I ever want four years from now is for some handsome medical student to threaten me with his flatulence.

**Alright, I didn't say it...but I was thinking it!

Down With The Sickness?

2007-02-07T15:20:00.000-08:00

Last week I came down with some strange mystery illness. It was so bad I had to make a trip to the local clinic and get a rapid strep test. The test was negative so I was denied antiobiotics (insert bitterness here). The doctor kicked me to the curb and I was unfortunately left to my own devices...so I overdosed on Wal-borne and Wal-profen (the knockoff versions of Airborne and Ibuprofen) and eventually got over it sometime last week.

Well, I thought I was in the clear until the Hunny Bunny came down with the same thing. She's been home all day playing with the dogs (let me express my jealousy here) and coughing up all kinds of fun stuff (just like I did last week!). It hasn't been pleasant, but she's a trooper. Anywho, it got me thinking about something and magically I stumbled upon my favorite comic strip from my undergrad years. I think it fits fantastically as we sort out who's coughing up what in this household...

Poppycock

2007-02-05T12:02:00.000-08:00

Recently I've been thinking a lot about my future. Not by choice, as many of you know I hardly think at all. But this time it's being forced upon me. We have to "choose" our schedules for our 3rd year of medical school by the end of this week. People keep telling us it really doesn't matter, but when you get down to the nitty-gritty...it really does.

Currently my leaning toward a specialty is Urology. I think if your an up-to-date reader of this blog you understand why. Since Urology is a "subspecialty" of surgery I have been advised NOT to rotate through surgery first next year. See, the key during your rotations is to basically show up and brown-nose for a number of weeks at a time. The more you brown-nose, the better grade you will recieve and so on and so forth. Apparently medicine is just one large butt-kissing totem pole. And at this time, I'm at the very bottom. Therefore, to get to the top of the totem pole, you want to perfect these so called "butt-kissing" skills before you show up in the rotation you might want to go into.

BUT, thereinlies the problem. Nobody is 100% sure of what they want to go into right now, at best it's just a "guestimation". I have some other areas I still want to check out, like the emergency room and anesthesiology to name a couple. Both of which ARE NOT on our schedule to rotate in next year.

So I meandered into the office today to try to get some light shed on this subject. Apparently in order to rotate through the ER, you have to be a fourth year. This poses a problem since by this time you are already scheduling away rotations at other hosipitals and setting up interviews for the "specialty" you want to go into. To add to the fire, when I asked about anesthesiology (also a surgery subspecialty) they allegedly DO NOT allow people to do two of these rotations in one year. So again, I would have to wait until fourth year to try this out as well.

If you ask me, this is a bunch of shennanigans. I mean C'mon. Everyone tells us to pick a field that we enjoy and love doing everyday because we'll have to do it the rest of our lives, then they go and tie our hands behind our backs and keep us away from all the cool rotations until it's too late to matter. I can just see the adminstration slapping high-fives anytime some punk 2nd year like me comes in and asks the same questions. They probably even bust out their little flasks of Brandy and toast each other knowing that they just created another disgruntled medical student who is stuck doing family practice.

Well I'm on to their tomfoolery. And rest assured that I'll beat the system. Ah Jota always finds a means to scam his way into something and out of family clinic. I just have get all the whining and complaining out of me first.....ahhhhh that's better.

It Was Sublime

2007-01-23T19:26:00.000-08:00

Tonight I embarked to make myself a late evening snack of the most delicious soup in the world...Top Ramen. It looked like an ordinary package, but as I was taught growing up, you can never judge a book by it's cover. I opened this beautiful little bag of crispy noodles and to my glory 2 PACKAGES OF BEEF FLAVORING FELL OUT!!! It was a divine experience. I'm a little winded from dancing around the house in glee. Well, enough procrastinating. It's time to enjoy this wonderful treat and bask in all the pulchritude of this momentus occasion...Time to enjoy double the flavor of beefy little noodles made with love.

Finally In The Driver's Seat***

2007-01-19T12:19:00.000-08:00

Well yesterday marked the beginning of my second semester of "preceptorshiphood", or whatever you want to call it. It was exciting. It was good to be back in the clinic. The smell of stagnant urine, antibacterial hand sanitizer, and chocolate brought back so many fond memories. Not only did the nurses remember who I was, but they loved my newfound glorious hair. I will remark that none of them were permitted to touch it, that priveledge is reserved for a select number of "special people" in my life.

The clinic was hopping. Patients were late for their appoinments, Dr. C was making runs to the OR, it was madness. I was even left unsupervised for a remarkable amount of time, which is never a good thing. I actually have a little disclaimer written on my shirt tags specifying not only the shirt's washing instructions, but also scenarios in which I am to be monitered at all times. Surprisingly enough, The Clinic is ONE of those places where I am not to be left "alone". So while Dr. C was gone, I saw patients, advised them on which surgeries to undergo, and passed out samples of Cialis*. It was almost as glorious as my hair!!

Shortly after I was reprimanded for my actions, we went back to work. Seeing patients with the intent NOT to do any harm. And then it came...My "right of passage". We were about to examine a new patient and I was offered the drivers seat. Yes, the coveted stool so I could nestle up close to the patient and do the exam myself. What was I about to investigate you ask, well I was looking for the elusive cystocele. With speculum in hand I assumed the position:

Ok, so it didn't quite look like this. I am much handsomer** than this guy. My skin is a golden brown, my hair is beautiful, and the lights were on in the room so a headlight was not necessary. Seriously, is this guy looking to excavate a coal mine???

Anyways, it was my first female exam on a real patient. It was a great experience. I knew what I was looking for, found it, touched it, and gave my patient a celebratory high five all in one quick flawless motion. Dr. C later remarked to me that I was moving up in the world. It was the "New Year" so I have more priveldges than before. Apparently that means I'm allowed to talk to and touch patients now. I have to say, I'm a big fan of my new responsibilities. They're way better than having to clean bedpans and fetching coffee for the residents.

With all that said, it was a good day. I learned a lot and proved that I'm handy with a speculum...if only that were "socially acceptable" outside of a hospital setting. I can't wait till next week. Maybe I'll get to prescribe meds...stay tuned.

*I'm embellishing a bit. Because it was brought to my attention that Cialis does not pass out samples since their stock has plummeted in recent months.

**If this isn't a word...it is now!

***This post is not for those with weak stomachs, under the age of 22, have symptoms of dizziness, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, anemia, throbocytopenia, or allergies to sulfa drugs or cats. The Hunny Bunny holds the right to remove said article from the World Wide Web if the content offends any of the above persons. Proceed at your own risk.

Maximum Density

2007-01-10T13:17:00.000-08:00

Well it has been an eye-opening week. School started, the dryer broke, and the scale told the truth. Yeah, you heard me. I tested the waters in the bathroom on Sunday night and I was disgusted at what I saw. After the Hunny Bunny denied that I had gained any weight, I waltzed right into the bathroom and left in shock. I was ashamed. I crawled back into bed with my tail between my legs to report the depressing news to my wife. TEN POUNDS!! In one semester I've managed to pull this magnificent feat off. And this weight is definitely NOT muscle.

I have to admit I knew it was true before the scale. I noticed over the past couple of months that it takes a little more "work" to wiggle into dress pants. I'm careful about the way I manuver in them so the structural integrity of the seam isn't tested too often. Belts are merely an accesory for some of my jeans, they're not needed to hold anything up...My fat butt takes care of that these days. I guess I just didn't want to admit it until Sunday night. I tried to avoid the inevitable by justifying these phenomena. I would tell myself that my clothes have been shrinking in the wash or that I was taller (since that translates into tighter fitting clothing). I was making excuse after excuse until that number flashed on the screen of our fancy digital scale (thanks Beez). It became real at that instant...I had reached the point of maximum density.

So what am I doing to fix this. I had a salad for lunch today. On top of that, The Hunny Bunny and I have made it to the gym the last two nights and put in a couple of miles on the treadmill. I've also tried burning calories by screaming at pedestrians as they walk past my house. That didn't work all that well since I would spend the following hour cowering in the corner hoping that the police had not been phoned.

Well it is the New Year so I'm pretty sure we all have our resolutions. You can probably guess that mine is to get as far away from maximum density as possible. I hope all of you stay away from it too, because we all know they don't make dress pants like they used to.

Merry New Year

2007-01-02T10:01:00.000-08:00

Well it has been such a busy couple of weeks I don't even know where to begin. I've been on my lustrious winter-break, and so far it's been rather busy. Christmas this year was celebrated on both sides of the country by The Hunny Bunny and I. First we hung out in Globe, AZ with my family for a "Mexican Christmas". It was great. All 7 of my grandma's kids, 11 grandkids, and who knows how many great grandkids and significant others crammed into her house for a couple of days of Christmas glee. After a gift exchange I sat down and consumed a few tamales which was like opening my own little presents for a half an hour.

Christmas day we got our stuff together and drove to the airport and jumped ship to sunny Florida, "The place where your underwear sticks to your butt". It was great. We landed and got to open even more gifts. We made out like bandits. After a busy week of Churchin', sight seein', and sleepin' we were exhausted. We rang in the new year only to wake up 3 hours later to head back to the airport and fly home.

Yesterday we were zombies. We didn't speak much, it was more of a gurgle when either one of us tried to open our mouths and talk. I surprisingly made it through the drive back to Tucson from Phoenix and watched the entire first half of the Rose Bowl. The Hunny Bunny had to tell me who won since I didn't survive the halftime show.

All-in-all it was a great year. I tied the knot in marriage, traveled halfway around the world, moved into our own little townhouse, it was great. I have more than enough to be thankful since none of this I deserve. 2006 was amazing, now let's wait and see how 2007 treats us. Until then, its time to enjoy the rest of my week off...

Finals Fever

2006-12-11T12:47:00.000-08:00

Well kids and kiddies its that wonderful time of year again, and I'm not talking about Christmas. I've been living in the library for the past 2 weeks ingesting a steady diet of caffeine and government cheese. That is the reason I've been MIA from everyone's radar screens. A couple quick observations from my head:

Things I'm not sure of:

I currently have no idea what day it is, what time it is, or even my own name. I don't even know how I navigated to this website.

Things I AM sure of:

That my first test today (Virology) sucked. There was a significant number of questions on things that weren't even in the notes. Why would you do that? I'm pretty positive I'm a little more crazy than before and I am in a constant state of "Irritability" (the Hunny Bunny is not pleased with this part).

A brief example of my irritablilty:

Just now while returning from an extended lunch after our first exam we passed an undergrad who just finished interviewing for next years incoming class. I offered no "hello, hope it went well"...of course not. I'm in too much of a bad mood. Instead I encourage her with these words of wisdom, "It's not too late to change your mind". Shes probably driving home thinking about getting a job a Starbucks and living the good life all becuase of some mad-at-the-world medical student. Oh well, it's way better than what i'm doing right now...

Anywho, I hope this made sense to at least one person and I apologize for my incoherent thoughts. The keyboard looks fuzzy from the lack of sleep mixed with the coffee I just spilled on them. Next time, I promise I'll be in a better mood. Cheers.

Happy Turkey Day

2006-11-22T15:36:00.000-08:00

A quick post to wish all of you happy readers out there a Happy Thanksgiving. I'll be using this weekend to cram my face with turkey as well as cramming my brain full of fun tidbits of pharmacology, virology, and pathology.

So feel free to indulge this weekend. 3 out of 4 doctors* recommend at least 6 servings of turkey per meal...and don't forget to "double-up" on the gravy.

*by doctors I mean medical students

Let Us Get it Schtarted*

2006-11-20T19:26:00.000-08:00

Lets face it. Indian accents are funny (Indians from Asia, not America). I never really thought about it prior to medical school. But I have noticed lately that many of my professors have very THICK Indian accents. Currently, 2 out of 4 lecturers have an Indian accent (like my Wirology* professor). I only point this out because of a comical incident that was had today in class. We were discussing the appendix (the organ, not the list of words at the back of your book). Our professor stated that in 50 million years humans would evolve to not have an appendix. I'll come back to that point shortly. He also claimed that our "pinky toes" are unnecessary as well which would cause them to fall off, at which point we would throw a celebratory extravaganza. Yipee. Just then another professor walked in the back and we were lucky enough to hear this little gem:

"Dr. Haiku, welcome. We were just talking about losing our little toes and having a party!"

Now imagine that all of the "W's" are pronounced with "V's" and any "T" sounds like he is trying to say "tart". Hilarious. I let out a huge "belly laugh". It was classic.

OK, back to my appendix. So I guess my professor is trying to imply evolution. An interesting point but I have a couple of questions. If we really are "evolving" and came from monkeys...why are there still monkeys? AND how come we don't see any "monkey boys" popping up all across the country from those dumb little monkeys evolving into humans? I guess I must have slept through that part of lecture or that entire course of biology in undergrad. If evolution does exist, I want a pet monkey boy. So until I get one, evolution will always be a mout point to me.

Well, until this gets straighted out, I guess I'll just concern myself with more important matters...laughing at funny Indian accents.

*Indian accent implied

Hello Jerry...

2006-11-16T15:27:00.000-08:00

I was watching Seinfeld last night and a classic episode (which one isn't) came on. It was the one where Jerry and George have to meet Elaine's father for dinner. She is late (of course) and the episode circles around the awkwardness of their meeting. Well before they leave for dinner George starts singing a song from the production, Les Miserables. It goes a little like this:

Master of the house
Doling out the charm
Ready with a handshake
And an open palm
Tells a saucy tale
Makes a little stir
Customers appreciate a bon-viveur

Glad to do a friend a favor
Doesn't cost me to be nice
But nothing gets you nothing
Everything has got a price!

Catchy, I know. But as you would expect, now I have this stupid song stuck in my head. I'm singing it everywhere. Just like Costanza!! And to complicate the matter even worse Jerry warns George of this very thing. He tells George that Schubert went crazy becuase he couldn't get a tune out of his head. Now I believe that I'm going crazy becuase this little ditty of a song is stuck in my head and the little leprechaun prancing around the house is telling me to "Burn Things". How does a "show about nothing" always seem to pertain to something? Darn you Mr. Seinfeld and your uncanny understanding of the human psyche.

Quote of the Day

2006-11-15T12:43:00.000-08:00

"Ah Jota, I'm having trouble hearing the lecture. Can you please turn your shirt down?"

-Montgomery

Apparently my friends don't approve of me wearing bright pink shirts to school. Hypocrites.

Ambivalence and Me

2006-11-08T15:56:00.000-08:00

I can't believe how uneventful my weeks have become of late. I meander to class, then to the library, then come home and annoy the Hunny Bunny with my antics. Thankfully she loves me and puts up with me. Someday I'll learn how to not push all of her buttons...all the time.

Anyways, the bulk of my weekly entertainment has been coming from my preceptor. It seems I can always get a good laugh from some old fashioned scatological humor. Normally its just me and the Doc, but this week was busy. We had 2 residents farting around with me. One seemed as if he had been around a few years and had a funny name so we will refer to him Vladimir. Well Vladdy apparently likes to ask questions, which led to me getting "pimped" for nearly the entire time I was there. For those of you unfamiliar with that term in the medical setting, I will define it for you:

Being "pimped" is when an attending physician/resident/wife gives you the Third Degree in front of everyone. They just keep asking question after question until you run out of responses. Its a very humbling (and uncomfortable) situation that you want out of as soon as you can.

After a couple hourse of this, we finally came to our last patient of the day and I assumed the position so I could be "pimped" again. The patient was a referal from another doctor in the hospital who had hydronephrosis (the patient, not the doctor). I was grilled for a good 10 minutes on what could possibly cause this. I rambled off a good 2 answers and my brain juices were exhausted. That obviously was not good enough and Vladimir gave me another 10 to match my 2. We also had the luxury of looking at her CT scan before going into the room. As we browsed the films we noticed splenomegaly (enlarged spleen) and some unknown mass at the back of her abdomen which her referring doctor claimed was "Idiopathic Retroperitoneal Fibrosis". This was the mass that was pushing on her ureter and giving her hydronephrosis. It was now time to see the patient and see if the doctor was right...

Now that the spotlight was off of me, we asked the patient a series of questions trying to get the bottom of her problem. In the midst of the exam we asked if she had experienced any recent weightloss. She answered yes and said it had been about 20-30lbs in the past couple of months (Red Flag). She also complained that she "hasn't felt like herself" (another Red Flag) and that foods just haven't "tasted the same" (yet another Red Flag).

I thought back 20 minutes to when I was being grilled by Vladimir and one of our possibilities for this mass was cancer. In that short 2 minutes of information I knew that the previous doctor was wrong and this poor woman had cancer.

Thus, enter my ambivalence. On one hand I was elated becuase everything that I had learned in Pathology had just been manifested right before my eyes in an actual patient. She had all the symptoms I'm supposed to think of when I think about cancer. I felt for once like I was a medical professional. Yet on the other hand this was an actual human being. It wasn't some made up scenario or example out of a book. I was sitting two feet from her, I knew her name, and had her entire history on the table in front of me. And now we had the job of telling her that we now had to seriously consider that she had cancer.

As I think about it even more, thats what medicine is all about. Its the study of disease. Its what we love to do becuase it fascinates us to think about how the body can go awry and given the right circumstances, our intervention can actually help a person get better. But its still grounded in reality. Medicine is not a game becuase these are real lives and we can't take them for granted or treat them as a disease and not give these people a name.

As for this woman, a round of tests and a few more doctors await to just delay the inevitable, the official word of cancer. But in Vladimir, the Doc, and my mind...we already know what is coming.

Ambivalence is a funny feeling...unfortunately, I think it's here to stay.

The Brown-Eyed Monster

2006-10-19T17:34:00.000-07:00

It was quite an eventful day in the clinic this afternoon. For those of you who don't know, I've have the priveledge to work in our world class Urology department once a week. Thus far its been a great experience. I have been learning a lot and on top of all of that it has me interested in the field as a possible specialty. But I digress. Today we were swamped, up to ears in patients. I was running fifteen minutes late and turns out I beat the Doctor by five minutes. Yet, nothing out of the ordinary as far as the patients we saw.

But for those unfamiliar with what a "urologist" does, let me fill you in. They help people who can't "pee" or have problems with their kidneys or "unmentionables". Its a subspecialty of surgery, which means they are surgeons. They just don't usually operate as often as other surgeons. All an all, an awesome field if you like surgery, not working 110 hours a week, and the smell of urine.

Anywho, we entered the room of a 92 year old patient. He himself happened to a cardiothoracic surgeon way back in the day (Translation: he's smarter than you and I). He was surprisingly alert for someone his age (obviously a doctor). He suffered from an enlarged prostate (Translation: big prostate makes it hard to pee-pee...you've seen the commercials). He had been on a couple of drugs which has shrunk his prostate but it was still larger than most. I've been in the clinic awhile so I knew the drill. When the doctor gloves up, my job is to squirt some KY Jelly on his finger, then observe. But today was different. Something was wrong with the cosmos, an ardvark farted in Wisconsin, A-Rod contemplated taking a pay-cut, something huge caused the Earth to tilt off its axis and made this day different from all the others...

As you may know the only way to get to the prostate is through the "rear-end", hence the necissity for KY Jelly. Apparently you want to feel a "rubbery" organ (hard masses indicate cancer). I've seen these done a bunch of times, well at least enough so I don't even cringe anymore. But like I said, today was different...today I heard the phrase, "Put some gloves on and go ahead and lube yourself up." GULP.

I was frozen for a split second becuase I couldn't believe the words that just came out of the Doctor's mouth. He proceeded to the tell the patient to drop trow and was about to experience two fingers (at different times of course). The patient seemed unphased and was now staring at me with his one good brown eye. The Doc went first and I followed quickly after with the look on my face that said, "I've done this a million times" when in actually I had no idea what I was feeling for. I was asked if I felt the enlarged prostate and I quickly answered "YES!" while I thought to myself, "I guess it could be enlarged if I only knew what a regular prostate felt like". As we exited the room I B-lined for the sink to wash my hands, just in case the glove had been "structurally compromised" during the exam.

All in all it was a fulfilling experience. It made me feel like a real doctor in a way, even though I had no idea what I was doing (I guess thats some peoples view of doctors anyways). But I have to say if any of you are given the the same situation where you are staring face to face with a Brown-Eyed Monster, I would turn and run for the hills for fingers sake.

Quit Googl-ing Yourself

2006-10-17T13:05:00.000-07:00

It was yet another uneventful day of class this morning. Lecturers had nothing impressive or profound to teach, yet I still managed to pay attention. My professionality was not matched however by some of my collegues. D-Rock* and Beez* were up to their same old tricks today. Surfing the web in search of something comical. Then it came...the tap on my shoulder. My attention was now directed towards D-Rocks computer screen as Beez whispered in my ear..."Its You!". Apparently they were correct. I was staring face to face with Mr Ah Jota:

After a quick Google Image Search of my name this is what those two monkeys came up with. Apparently Mr Ah Jota was running for some sort of congressional seat in the UK as a conservative. Obviously, it's the only thing we had in common (being conservative, not a politician).

This got my wheels turning. I wondered which of my closest associates had an alter-ego in existence on the web....

The first person I thought of turned out to be the most comical. Mr Micheala Watsopoplle* (one of my distinguished groomsman from the summer) is apparently wanted in Texas (if you have any more information about him, please contact your local authorities):

And lets just say I'm glad I didn't marry a nurse named The Hunny Bunny*...here is another version of Mrs Ah Jota:

Interestingly enough, when I googled my Brother-in-law Isaacrat*...

I pulled up an actual picture of my actual grandfather-in-law, Isaacrat the Apostle*:

So needless to say, when you think you are alone in this world...you really aren't. Your alter-ego probably exists and is more than likely fleeing the state of Texas for a crime he/she may or may not have committed. And if you can't find your alter-ego on the internet, rest assured that they are out there. They just haven't figured out how to upload an image of themselves to the world wide web yet.

*Names have been changed to protect the innocent, especially since one is awaiting criminal charges if he ever shows up in Texas

Running from Humbleness

2006-10-10T14:39:00.000-07:00

Well friends of friends, I've been quite the slacker with this blog as of late. So for those of you who have been crying for my dry sarcastic babel, I'm back. I personally thought I would have plenty of stories to tell after an entire week off from a grueling medical school career, but I was wrong. Last week I basically tried to see how much TV I would be able to take in and avoided human contact (other than my wife's) all together.

Nonetheless, here is one humorous anecdote from the break...it goes as follows:

It had been roughly 3 weeks since the last time I had any physical activity. My days over the past few weeks consisted of meandering in the library, drinking caffeine, and muttering useless movie quotes to myself to keep me motivated (rudy...Rudy...RUdy...RUDy...RUDY...get the picture?). This gave me the great idea to set out on a nice little "jog" around the neighborhood on my first Monday off. One problem I have is I tend to set some pretty high standards for myself and forget to ease my way into physical actviity, especially after my life's longest execise drought. Thus, I poorly chose to circle the ENTIRE neighborhood which made the total distance about 2 miles (wise choice). It started out well, hair flapping in the wind...the whole 9 yards. But as I hit the midway point I began to realize the mistake I had made. My lungs hurt...I mean A LOT. I think it was because they were bleeding and my body was doing just about anything to get me to stop. But you can't stop Ah Jota that easily, I ventured on. As I rounded the 1.5 mile marker my pace had slowed quite a bit but I was determined to make it back to my doorstep. Then it hit me with just about a quater mile left....the unmistakeable urge to BARF! I was now hunched over in the shade behind a tree in some guy's front yard trying to avoid the now inevitable. I took small breaths since one large breath might just give the previous nights dinner a chance of escape. My legs were basically useless at this point, so the idea of "walking it off" wasn't even possible. So I stayed there hunched in the "I was just punched in the stomach" position. But Mexitaliamer's are a tough nut to crack. Yes I reminded myself if Frodo Baggins can carry a stupid little ring, I can suck it up and take the pain. I stood myself up and began staggering home. Though I didn't run home, I reached the front door full of pride because I was able to choke back the unavoidable. I stared the Vomit Comet right in the eye and laughed in its face. I made it home without chundering all over my shoes, which keeps the wife happy and the floor clean. I guess all of us have to humbled every once in awhile. It's too bad that this time it had to be me....

Schooooool's Out....For a Week

2006-09-29T15:38:00.000-07:00

Well I know I have been incognito for a little while, believe me if I had it my way that wouldn't have been the case. Sadly, I've been locked away in the library for the past couple of weeks pretending that I'm a medical student. Its been pretty brutal preparing for this round of exams. I've been gone so much my wife didn't even recognize me when I walked through the front door the other night. She screamed and thought that Adam Morrison had come to challenge her to a game of H-O-R-S-E.

Anyways, yesterday I mustered up what little energy I had left and pulled one last hardcore study day. The result: 13 hours straight in the library. Though the rest of the week wasn't as bad as that, it sure felt like it. My only outlet lately has been in my car on the drive home. With my brain resembling the consistency of mashed potatos I click on the radio as I mindlessly weave in and out of on-coming traffic.

What serenades me you may ask? Well, thats the point of this little blog. It is the voice of the one and only Vince Furnier. To the more educated readers, you should already know who that is. To you novices out there, Vince's more well published name is Alice Cooper.

Mr. Nice Guy currently works as a late night DJ for a local radio station that I quickly turn to when I cruise around town any time later than 8 o'clock. This just happens to be every time I leave the library near exam time.

For those of you who are interested, Vince was born in Detroit, Michigan to Ether Moroni Furnier and Ella Mae McCart and after a series of childhood illnesses, he moved to Phoenix, Arizona. His grandfather, Thurman Sylvester Furnier, was an ordained Apostle of The Church of Jesus Christ. I personally met Vince at the ripe young age of 4 years at a church event. As you well know, I can't remember anything past breakfast so the details of this event are known to me only through the stories my mother has told me. But I heard Vince was overcome by my childhood abilities and was forced to cut all ties with me at that time...

Even though the two of us have an obvioius storied history together, he has failed to contact me during his stint as a "hot-shot DJ". I hope he does soon since rumor has it that he has in his possession his grandfather's library which I would salivate at the chance to rummage through given the opportunity. But I can't promise patience forever, I may just have to contact Vince myself to talk about old times and help remind him of his roots....

Meet me at Morrison Avenue

2006-09-19T10:33:00.000-07:00

Well with midterms less than a week a time honored tradition was brought back. Every semester the "gang" and I set out to grow Finals Beards. Well, everyone else does and I always seem to fail miserably. I guess I will just have to wait to hit puberty so I can grow hair in funny places and start liking girls. But I digress...since it is only midterms the beard didn't seem so fitting. So thus it was conceived....THE MIDTERM MOUSTACHE.

So about a week ago Montgomery, D-Rock, Beez, Jimmy D and I all began growing our "belly-ticklers". With the exception of Jimmy D, I am a little behind the learning curve. Normally that would bother me but not today....

After sleeping in the morning I took a nice long shower and shaved the peach-fuzz off the rest of my face leaving me with my own personalized "flavor-savor". As I stepped out of the shower, this is what I saw in the mirror:

Yes, I confused myself with the Gonzaga Bulldog star Adam Morrison. For those of you who haven't seen me in awhile my hair is ridiculously long and when it's wet, it just flops all over the place. Granted I'm a little better looking than Morrison as well as a shade or two darker, but the resemblence this morning in the mirror was striking.

So at least for the next two weeks I don't mind that my moustache growing is "sub-par". I'll embrace my Morrison-look-a-like status and maybe even sign some fake autographs while I'm at it.

Fun With Medical Terminology

2006-09-18T14:25:00.000-07:00

Surprisingly over the past year and a quarter I've been able to acquire a large repitoire of useless information my professors tell me some day will be useful in saving the lives of my patients. I try not to take it so seriously. So instead, Beez and I have taken it upon ourselves to come up with new applications for common medical terminology we have encountered while in medical school. Here's just a few things we've come up with:

Tamponade - "a situation where fluid collects between the heart muscle and the pericardial sac. The pressure within the sac makes the heart unable to expand and open its ventricles, meaning that no blood flows in or out of the heart. If left unchecked, this condition will end in death."

Our Definition: The worst sports drink ever!

Prostate Chips : "Obtained by a transurethral resection of the prostate, which yields the small "chips" of rubbery prostatic tissue used to diagnose disease."

Our Definition: The worst side dish a person could order.

Bullet Wipe : "A darkened ring around the immediate margins of a bullet hole. This ring of residue is caused by lead being wiped from the surface of the bullet as it passes through the body." (according to our forensic pathology lecture on gunshot wounds)

Our Definition: Toilet paper of the future

Sloughing : "Shedding of endometrial tissue during menarche."

Our Definition: We don't have one, we're just grossed out everytime we hear this term.

Milk Letdown : "Occurs when oxytocin causes contraction of the smooth muscle layer of band-like cells surrounding the alveoli (of the breast) to squeeze the newly-produced milk into the duct system, allowing an infant to be fed."

Our Definition: Again, we don't have one. We just chuckle like a couple of immature 4-year olds when we hear this one.

I know we have many more but since it is so close to midterms...I have bigger fish to fry. This will have to hold you over for now, let me know if you have any that should be added to the list.

Oh, and by the way. Don't call me "immature" for being amused by things of this nature. You know the people who invented each term chuckled just as hard as we do whenever they hear these terms too ;)

Who You Callin' Chicken?

2006-09-12T11:17:00.000-07:00

Over the past few weeks I've been exposed to a hilarious sitcom. Apparently it has been pulled from the shelves but it is still available on dvd. Its called Arrested Development. It centers around a crazy family and its business that goes broke and the one sane family member that tries to pull them from the wreckage.

I probably like it so much becuase it sounds a lot like my family. Except my family:

A) Doesn't own a business
B) There isn't one "sane" person left since we all know I don't fit that category
C) There really isn't any wreckage to be pulled from, since we all seem to be doing well for ourselves

Hmmm. Ok I guess I can't draw too many comparisons and probably just like it for the dry, sarcastic humor and the pleasure it brings me outside of any comparisons I try to confabulate.

That long-winded introduction brings me to a point I want to make. The show has an uncanny way of pointing out that somebody is a "chicken". After you clean up from peeing your pants in laughter, please continue reading.

This is so awesome I want to start a trend. Anytime you feel happy, excited, giddy, or just in the mood to make a fool of yourself....you need to perform the chicken dance. ALSO, any time you want to taunt someone I EXPECT you to behave in this manner.

To many I suppose this will sound "silly" or "childish" and to those people I will say, quit taking yourself so seriously. If you bust out with this type of behavior, people will hail you as the life of the party and the funniest person they have met in quite some time. So my suggestion is just to try it. Not only will other people like you, but you'll like yourself more for just stepping out of your comfort zone for once in your life. I ask no monetary reward for helping you down the path of self discovery...just your friendship since I don't have very many friends.

I hope the next time I run into you I'll be a witness to your new-found sense of pride and chicken-dancing ability. You just better not be calling me a chicken....

Quote of the Weekend

2006-09-11T12:14:00.000-07:00

"Surlinger" is highlighter-speak for spanish.....what?!?!?!

-Ah Jota

The Monster Known as SWAMBA

2006-09-06T15:18:00.000-07:00

Now I know many of you unfamiliar with the term are already shaking in your boots. Some may think its a mystical creature that devour your soul in a blink of its eye, thankfully I am able to say that a guess like that is incorrect. SWAMBA is actually an acronym, so it can't really eat your soul (I hope). It stands for SouthWest Area Missionary Benevolent Association. In short it is the youth group of our church here in the southwest region, of which I belong.

This Labor Day weekend was our annual region campout and boy was it a blast. I had some concerns going in that it wouldn't live up to camps of the past but it did. First of all, this is the first time I was attending camp as a married man, which means no more bunking with the boys. It was just me, the hunny bunny, and any arachnids that could squeeze in through the door frame. Secondly, we had a to have a business meeting during campout. Let me explain the gravity of this situation. By having a business meeting during recreation means no basketball for AJ!!! This was upsetting, but I got over it since in the business meeting The Italian Stallion was elected as the new area president and I got to play basketball on Sunday anyways. So thankfully all of my concerns were addressed and it turned out to be a great weekend.

Saturday camp is more or less kicked off since everyone has arrived by then. We have a short chapel service followed by seminars. Since I have the attention span of a 4 year old, I attended the young people seminar. It was awesome. It coincided with the theme "Ye Who Are Called To Labor" and provided just the boost everyone needed. We discussed a gauntlet of ideas surrounding the theme including what holds us back from doing so, where everyone was able to chime in with what held them back personally from serving the Lord.

The night meeting was powerful and was followed by a bonfire where we had smores (yes I know, smores have nothing to do with the theme but they sure are delicious). I was able to do some catching up with my good buddy Emilio and then went to bed early since I'm an old married man.

Sandwiched between our two services on Sunday we were able to fit in the games which I prepared for the weekend. These were straight from the convoluted thoughts of my own head and one of which went as follows. The Benjaminites (one of the 12 tribes of Israel) had 700 left-handed warriors that could sling a rock at a hair and not miss (Judges 20:16). I was so impressed by this scripture I made a game in honor of it. I thought hair...shaving cream. Rocks....hmmm....can't throw them at church....but you can throw goldfish!!! And the game was born. Throwing goldfish and peoples faces covered in shaving cream, just like its depicted in the scriptures. Here were the winners of this event....

If you look close at this next picture you can see the impish grin on my face because all these people let me cover their faces in shaving cream. Success!!

So I think in the end its pretty self explanatory, church camps can be fun even if you can't bunk with the boys, have to go to a business meeting, and certain individuals (Michella and Lucas Aurelius) manage to testify twice in one meeting. And thus its gets no better than "Loving God, Loving Each Other".....

Old Man McMullen

2006-08-29T22:41:00.000-07:00

What I thought was a completely uneventful day turned out to be pretty fulfilling when it was all said and done. Class was basically uneventful other than having to wipe drool from D-rock's face during the Micro lecture. Class was followed by a nice lunch at Rubio's. Then the fun began. As Beez and I meandered up the stairs to the fourth floor of the AHSL library we stumbled upon a shopping cart filled with the remains of the study tables. We decided we would do what any reasonable medical student would do when faced with a similar situation....hijack the shopping cart. We spent the next five minutes unloading the cart piece by piece only to be confronted by one of the constructions workers. He looked at us like we both had 3 heads. I myself was a deer in the headlights while Beez managed to utter "desk....part....take....I". I'm still not sure what he meant. Surprisingly the grizzled looking man let us go free with no questions. The fun began shortly thereafter. I hopped in the basket and we were off...

I discovered the hard way that not all the wheels worked on this cart. The front of the cart took a nose dive and I went with it. I made it out unscathed so I tried to return the favor to Beez. After a good push I let the fautly wheel take over and tried to plant him into the abandoned fourth floor, and as the story of my life goes...I failed again. Not a scratch on him. Darn you Beez and your cat-like reflexes.

The fun continued in the study room as we reviewed hypersensitivity and genetic disorders with Kevin Dim. It was then that our world was turned upside down. The one and the only Natheniel T. McMullen scampered up the stairs to the barren floor.

This strikingly handsome bloake taught many a lectures last year in histology. I personally thought he was top shelf as far as histology professors go. The sexual development lectures he taught were one of a kind...

He looked around as though he was lost (I immediately thought it was Alzheimers or some sort of dissociative fugue). He shortly proved me wrong. Old Man McMullen fell into some deep trance while staring out the window. Then it began...he cracked his neck and went into a 20 minute routine of Tai Chi. I'm not an expert on the subject so was it was fun as ever to insert a "HiiiiiiYaaaaa" every time he reached an attack pose. I laughed so hard I nearly peed my pants.

So in summary: shopping cart races are fun, crazy old men doing Tai Chi is funny, and I need to do less of this and study more.

How it Started....

2006-08-28T15:53:00.000-07:00

Well I guess I'm going to join the hype of "blogging". I'm still not sure what on earth that word means, but hey half the words I use I don't understand so that eliminates that problem. To make the situation worse, nobody even pays attention to me when I talk anyways....Life is soooo cruel.

Anywho, I'm nowhere as talented as some of my blog-happy friends, nor do I have the vernacular to write more than a couple of sentences without repeating myself without repeating myself. dangit.

The premise of this experiment is to get my creative juices flowing and give the Hunny Bunny yet another avenue to be proud of me for doing something productive with my time. Well if she wants productivity, here it is at its best. And I'll start it off with the story of the fabled creature....THE MEXITALIAMER.....

Ok, so its not so much a fabled creature but a chaotic half Mexican/half Italian/half American blend of 46 X,Y (look ma' proper notation) chromosomes which somehow ended up as ME. Hold it. That did not add up to 100%. The Mexican region of my brain is in charge of mathematics. Thankfully, mathematics aren't necessary in medical school. Apparently studying isn't necessary either since that is what I should be doing right now. Alright back to the subject at hand.

The Mexican part of this devious concoction of genetic inaccuracy is demonstrated by my ability to sweat chorizo straight through my pours as well jump fences in a single bound. Don't act like your not impressed.

My wit, charm, stunning good looks, ability to quote obscure Godfather movie references, pronounce the word "gnochhi" correctly, and identify Italy on a map are a culminated of the Italian part of me.

Lastly, I was born in this great country of Mex...I mean AMERICA. A land where the beer flows like wine and the women flock like the salmon of Capistrano.

And thus you have it Mexican+Italian+American = a Mexitaliamer. Shortly after my birth, this mold was broken so yes, I am one of a kind.

Stayed tuned kids and kiddies. It's going to be a fun year......